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Heart Messages 
From the Trenches 



HEART MESSAGES 

FROM 

THE TRENCHES 



By 
Nellie Rosilla Taylor 




1917 

ROBERT J. SHORES 

NEW YORK 



Copyrighted, 1917 

By 

ROBERT J. SHOEES 



All Rights Reserved 



NEW AND IMPORTANT BOOKS 

OUR UNITED STATES ARMY 

By Helen S. Wright 

THE DESTINY OF THE UNITED STATES 
By Snell Smith 

DOLLARS AND CENTS 

By Albert Payson Terhune 

BUCKING THE TIGER 

By Achmey Abdullah 

THE ANCIENT QUEST 

By Reginald Wright Kauffman 

THE DRUMS AND OTHER POEMS 

By Walter Romeyn Benjamin 

THE MASTER OF BONNE TERRE 

By William Antony Kennedy 



M 23 1917 

©CI.A470061 



DEDICATION 

A simple verse I send to you — Humanity, 

I am your kin, and you, my Brother man. 
Adown the world-ways, journey we together, 

Where strife is calling' — hasten, while we can. 
Give strength to weakness, courage to the fallen, 

Though darkness wraps in gloom the setting sun. 
The night has eyes, that look to a tomorrow 

Where smiles a day, when sorrowing is done. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 

BY 

Nellie Kosilla Taylor 

One of the hardest tasks that is sometimes 
set down for an author to do, is to write con- 
cerning self. I trust my readers will appre- 
ciate this and excuse me from writing much 
concerning the personal pronoun I. 

I am assured, however, that all those who 
read this volume, will want to know a few 
things concerning the letters and the poems 
herein contained. 

With the single exception of the one thou- 
sandth letter, which I give in this volume as 
the sample of the style of the letter written 
by me to the men in the European conflict, 
all the other letters contained in this book 
were written by the soldiers to me and are 
answers to the letters I have written them. 
They came to me from trench and hospital in 
war-stricken lands across the sea. In writing 

7 



HEART MESSAGES 



the poems in this book, I at no time, gave 
much thought concerning their literary merit. 
My intention was solely to entertain, and if 
possible, to bring a little diversion into the 
hearts of troubled men. Some of the poems 
may seem to be clothed in sadness. If this be 
true, it may interest my readers to know they 
were of the type of verse well-liked by men in 
battle-scarred regions of Europe. I am giv- 
ing only a few poems, feeling assured the 
letters will be far more interesting to read. 

My letters have been examined and appre- 
ciated by many American gentlemen of great 
prominence, and many of them have been read 
by His Royal Highness, The Duke of Con- 
naught, and also have been read by the Hon- 
orable Colonel W. K. McNaught, C. M. GL, of 
Canada, a gentleman to whom I am indebted 
for this encouragement in my efforts to give 
this volume to the world. 

Colonel McNaught is well-known in Canada, 
through his activity in promoting Public 
Ownership and other legislation in the in- 
terests of the people generally. He has also 
taken an active part in organizations connected 

8 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



with the war, and in this way he has been 
brought very closely in touch with Canadian 
soldiers both at home and on the European 
firing line. In recognition of his public services 
he was, in 1914, made a Companion of the 
Order of St. Michael and St. George. 

Concerning the letters in this volume he 
writes: "It is my hope and my belief that 
millions of copies will be sold to the American 
people alone." 

Should this hope be verified, suffering 
humanity in the war-stricken lands of Europe 
will be benefited. 

If there is a cord of sympathy in human 
hearts, let it go forth and as a life-line let it 
twine itself around the struggling people, 
whose moans are calling to us for aid. 

I am also indebted to Anthony J. Drexel 
Biddle, F.R.G.S., a well-known Philadelphia 
gentleman, for his kind expressions in behalf 
of my efforts, and for his belief in the response 
humanity will send to greet the lines in this 
volume. 

Mr. Biddle is well-known all over America 
as a philanthropist, an author, Corresponding 

9 



HEART MESSAGES 



Member Societe Archeologique de France-, and 
as the founder of the Drexel Biddle Bible 
Classes, an International Organization con- 
sisting of one hundred and fifty thousand men. 
He has reflected much credit on himself^ in 
his zeal to assist his country by founding the 
Training Corps, incorporated under the laws 
of Pennsylvania. 

Keader, it is such men as I have introduced 
to you who will go with us, into the trench 
and into the hospital, where we may read 
what is written on the hearts of men in the 
European conflict. 

We can talk freely concerning the writing 
we find on those troubled hearts, for as time 
goes to meet time, the only name by which 
any of those warriors will ever be known, will 
be by the sacred name of Soldier. 



10 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



PREFACE 

BY 
HONORABLE COL. W. K. McNAUGHT, O. M. G. 

No one can read the heart-touching letters 
and poems contained in this volume without 
a feeling of admiration for the splendid hero- 
ism of the men who are fighting for Freedom 
and Humanity on the battle-field of Europe, 
or without realizing that war is a scourge 
which should hereafter be made absolutely 
impossible in this age of civilization and 
Christian enlightenment. 

The thorough contempt which Germany 
has shown for solemn treaties to which she 
was a contracting party, the savage brutality 
of the German Military Machine and its utter 
disregard of every amenity which differen- 
tiates civilized warfare from that of barbar- 
ism; last but not least, the heartless slaughter 
of innocent women and children in their 
hellish submarine and Zeppelin warfare; these 
things have created such a feeling of horror 
and disgust, throughout the civilized world 

11 



HEART MESSAGES 



that it will take Germany many long years of 
repentance and good conduct to live down. 

The great majority of American people, 
true to their traditions, and loyal to the prin- 
ciple of Justice and Liberty, the cornerstones 
on which their Constitution was founded, have 
been heartily in sympathy with the Allied 
cause, and although they have remained 
strictly neutral, and made no sacrifice of life 
in what we believe to be a sacred crusade, they 
have certainly done great and noble service 
in succoring the destitute of war-scourged 
Europe and alleviating the sufferings of those 
who have been wounded in battle. Their 
splendid response to the calls of suffering 
humanity has touched a ' sympathetic chord in 
every Allied heart. 

Never has the line of cleavage between 
Liberty and Despotism been so plainly drawn 
as at present, when this war will undoubtedly 
decide whether the world will be ruled here- 
after by German Military Despotism, or be 
the home of free men whose Government shall 
be, of, for, and by the people. 

The world is too small for both of these 

12 



!FB,OM THE TRENCHES 



ideals to live side by side. One of them must 
walk the plank, and the Allies are determined 
that Military Despotism must be that one. 

To us in Canada, who have given freely of 
our best for this sacred cause, money counts 
but as dross, when weighed against the splen- 
did young manhood that we have sent to fight 
for Freedom and Humanity on the battlefields 
of Belgium and France. 

Thousands of them have already offered up 
their lives, and thousands more will, doubt- 
less, make the supreme sacrifice before the 
war will be brought to a successful conclusion. 
But they and we have made our sacrifices 
willingly, knowing that National and Indi- 
vidual liberty has always been purchased by 
blood, and that it is only by self-sacrifices, 
such as these, that the greatest boons to hu- 
manity have ever been obtained. 

We are fighting if possible, to make war 
impossible. So far as the Allies are concerned, 



the war, which was not of their seeking, will 
be fought *to a finish in order to determine 
whether in the years to come the world shall 
organize for Peace or War as its chief business. 

13 



HEART MESSAGES 



Never before in the history of the world has 
there been so stupendous a struggle or so 
gigantic and precious a sacrifice, and we owe 
it to those who have fought our battles and 
died for us, to carry aloft the Standard of 
Liberty which they have flung to those who 
followed, until the last vestige of Militarism 
has been trampled under foot. 

We can erect no nobler monument to their 
memory than to endeavor to impress upon the 
world's innermost heart, the realization that 
their sacrifice has broadened the heritage of 
Liberty and Human Eights, made the world a 
better place to live in, and brought nearer the 
time when men shall beat their swords into 
pruning hooks and learn the art of war no 
more. 

Our heroes will not have died in vain, if as 
a result of this struggle, there shall have been 
seared into the world's conscience the con- 
viction, that the "Golden Kule" is as binding 
upon nations as upon individuals; that inter- 
national relations should be placed upon a 
basis of Justice instead of Brute Force, so 
that even the smallest of nations may have an 

U 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



opportunity of peacefully working out its 
national ideals and aspirations. In short, 
that men the world over will realize as they 
have never before realized, "The Fatherhood 
of God and the Brotherhood of Man." 

To Nellie Rosilla Taylor whose single- 
hearted devotion to the Allied Cause has made 
possible the publication of these heart-throbs 
direct from the battlefields of Europe, the 
American people are indebted for a fascinat- 
ing volume which will be an Inspiration as 
well as a Revelation to every lover of Personal 
and National Liberty. 

W. K. McNaught, 
Canada. 



15 



HEART MESSAGES 



AMERICAN PREFACE 

Header, as the night-sky is illuminated with 
stars to brighten the darkness, so, in our 
mysterious lives, wherein so much seems dark, 
luminaries occasionally shine in our midst to 
brighten gloom. 

Down succeeding centuries poets have 
blazoned the way with messages which have 
resounded through the entire world. We all 
know many of those messages can never die. 
Such messages were sent into a world of 
troubled men from the rare mind of Nellie 
Kosilla Taylor, and she is sending the answers 
from those messages to you. 

Her appeals reached the immortal side of 
man's nature and followed him into the field 
of battle and there they cheered the wounded 
and gave comfort to the dying. 

By the fitful light of a flaring torch, or un- 
der the flickering candle ray, men deep in 
trench mire, men who were soldiers, gathered 
together that they might read and find 
comfort. 

16 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



Some of the greatest men in the world of 
letters are awaiting the coming of this volume, 
and those who read it will not be surprised 
to know that many who have heard the letters 
read express the belief that they will be a 
great revelation from a human standpoint. 

The badge of one of the most distinguished 
and historic regiments in the whole world, 
now at the front, has been presented to Nellie 
Kosilla Taylor in recognition of her splendid 
and unselfish work for men hidden away in 
trench-misery and discomfort. 

Many of the letters and poems sent to the 
troubled men were written during the first 
eighteen months of the war and a man well 
versed in conditions there has assured Nellie 
Rosilla Taylor that her messages aided and 
comforted many men as death came to claim 
them. 

Not only have our brothers across the sea 
been comforted by the pen of this lady, but she 
has been .active also in many other directions, 
causing help and comfort to visit the suffering 
abroad and at home. 

It is the belief of all who have listened to 

17 



HEART MESSAGES 



the reading of the letters and poems contained 
in this volume, that others, now groping in 
darkness, may, by reading them, find a new 
light and by it read anew as they journey on. 
Anthony J. Drexel Biddle, F.R.G.S. 



18 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



PREPAREDNESS 

A nation unprepared invites the tyrant in, 
To grasp the jewels that she does not prize, 
When honor hides behind imagined wrong, 
To strike a neighbor of the lesser size. 

A nation unprepared ! A land of dream ideals, 
While guns are calling by the cannon's opened 

jaw. 
The man of action is the man of peace, 
'Tis he, who writes the everlasting law. 

A nation unprepared! Oh, — -what a sorry 

truth. 
To learn for all time, of a neighbor's worth. 
From voice of gun, and the red tongue of 

flame, 
Must come protection for the men of earth. 



19 



Heart Messages from the Trenches 



The Flag of a Fellow's Country. 

The other night the boys had a call to go 
forward, but I was left behind, too ill to go on. 
I strained my eyes trying to see if I could 
make out the forms of my comrades through 
the darkness. In a little while I had to cover 
my ears against the terrible rumble or I would 
have limped on and gone out there with my 
comrades. Soon the night was red by fire that 
seemed suddenly to come up from the earth. 
As I lay on my cot I felt dizzy; just to be 
looking out on the red light and the blackness 
of night. If ever we get back home many of 
us fellows could be developed into the most 
wonderful- surgeons. One grows accustomed 
to seeing red rivers flowing through white 
open skins. Wounds are common occurrences 
now, and we often look back and wonder that 

21 



HEART MESSAGES 



they ever could have been the exception. Some- 
times, when we see wounded comrades, and 
as we watch them dying, we just grit our teeth 
and we swear to avenge their suffering. 

The tobacco kind people have sent to us, is 
great! So are the socks the good women 
have knit for us and the mufflers, and we 
appreciate, too, the great things men have 
done. We fellows like to know we are not 
forgotten by a world that seems to us now 
like a dream of long ago. Sometimes, when 
no one is looking on, the tears in our eyes will 
not stay back when we get to thinking about 
old friends, old days, and the folks back at 
home when some of us were mean enough to 
be too hard to please. It takes the flag of a 
fellow's country to bring out the best that is 
in his nature. Just tell all the boys for us 
that a lot of good may come from suffering 
patiently endured. We have learned one great 
lesson here in the trenches and that is — too 
much ease — too many comforts — can easily 
rot character. 

It was a mighty handsome bunch of chaps 
who were called out the other night. You 

22 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



should have seen their excitement when they 
were going. Some of them yelled with the 
fury of a great joy and when their voices were 
all blended together they sounded just like 
one great — ah! 

Those who were left behind looked as though 
they had been neglected to be invited to a great 
feast. I was one who was left behind and I 
know just how that feels. A friend of mine 
who has been beside me most of the time since 
I came here was among the men who went out 
with the others. He came back after the fight 
was over almost exhausted, but he was unhurt 
and he told me that when he was coming back 
to his dug-out, he walked through avenues of 
dead and wounded men. Eain was falling 
and it was cold, but he told me that through 
the whole inferno men kept their nerve and 
did everything in such a quick and orderly 
way that the dead and wounded were soon 
cared for. 

In fhe whole tracery of this awful affair 
one thing astonishes many of the men here 
and many a time we talk about it but can 
find no answer. It is this, how wonderfully 

23 



HEART MESSAGES 



active men can be when it comes to killing- 
time, and how equally active they can be in 
caring for the men they have either killed or 
wounded. We fellows talk here quite a lot 
about a germ we know to be sleeping. It is a 
germ that we whisper about but rarely talk 
of in the open. We know now there is a sleep- 
ing germ of Brutality in every man's heart. 
That germ only wants a good reason to sting 
him into activities. Let that germ wake in a 
man's heart and unless someone places a cool 
hand on his hot head he can easily be reduced 
to the level almost of a fighting beast. Con- 
vince a man he has cause to fight and his color 
changes to the livid or the red, and the fire- 
flies in his eyes will be sure to guide his fists 
to their destination. 

I am no more afraid to die than is any other 
man here and if giving my life to aid humanity 
will do the trick I am ready to go at any min- 
ute. It might sound better, however, after I 
am buried in some unmarked grave if what I 
am about to say should be read to others. If 
men's bodies must be the loom on which 
humanity must be woven into better ways, 

24 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



physicians should find some antidote to relieve 
the suffering of helpless women and children. 
A little chap here told me that your country 
is tired of war talk. I absolutely refuse to 
believe that. What your country hears about 
us and about how we are faring will be a great 
help if war decides some day to visit your side 
of the world. 

I got a bite from wire entanglements. I 
shall feel their accursed teeth as long as I live. 
I escaped by giving them only a bite before 
they had a chance to mouth and swallow me 
completely. Another thing I heard here also, 
and as I heard it from the same little chap 
who told me that your country is tired of war 
talk, it may be that one of his stories is just 
as true as the other one. He tells me that he 
knows for a fact that never in the history of 
the world has there been a time when so many 
Bibles have been sold to the world as were 
sold before this war came. When he told me 
the Bibte story there came into my mind an 
experience I had one day returning from an 
attack. I picked up a helmet that had fallen 
from the head of a dead German. Inside the 

25 



HEART MESSAGES 



helmet was written in German letters : "I have 
put on the helmet of Salvation." 

I am wondering — and not only am I won- 
dering, but a lot of the other boys talk of it 
too, if some day when the trenches are all re- 
filled, when cattle come straying over the 
firing line, when the shadows of shepherds 
drape the spot where so many men have fallen 
— if people will need a tolling bell to remind 
the shepherds that they are guiding where 
men have offered up such awful sacrifices. To 
our minds it is the humble people who will 
think of us the longer. People filled with 
prosperity will seek the gay sunshine and will 
be sure to avoid even the memory of cloudy 
days. Well, we hope that if people think, they 
will teach their children to pray that sacri- 
fices have not been made in vain. And so I 
say, — and so say the boys around me, — for 
I have read this letter to them, that as we 
battle on, as we suffer, as we endure, we say 
also, to those who have gone before us from 
this conflict, — may they rest in peace. 

(Somewhere in France.) 



2G 



PEOM THE TRENCHES 



THE EOAD TO YONDER TOWN 

There was turmoil in the village, 
The boys were to leave at noon, 
For the joy of it, flags were waving 
To the call of the bugle's tune. 
High in the trees, to the tree-tops 
The envious small boy clung, 
While onto painted gate laths 
The form of a fair child swung. 

For weren't the soldiers coming? 

They were to pass that way. 

All night long, she had watched for the dawn 

That would bring her this wonderful day. 

Why was it mother was weeping, 

As she tried hard to hide her tears? 

Why was it father did things so odd — 

Like a man filled up with fears? 

Wasn't the music playing? 
Wasn't the sun in the sky? 
Why was it sweethearts were sighing 
At the sound of two words, "Good-bye"? 
The boys were dressed so grandly; 
There were good things for all to eat — 
And father went from the table 
To give John the honored seat. 

27 



HEART MESSAGES 



Mother, she just kept busy, 

Always turning her head away. 

As John looked down on his well-filled plate 

Saying, "This is a very fine day, 

Somehow, it's too fine to be eating, 

A fellow don't need to eat, 

When he's just chuckful of dreaming 

Of the tyrants he means to defeat." 

And then a face from the garden 
Looked through the window frame. 
It was John's sweetheart, Mary, 
Saying only, "It looks like rain." 
Now the sun was high in the heavens 
But nobody looked that way. 
Somehow everyone acted queer, 
Because soldiers were going away. 

Then came the call of the bugle, 

Mother ran quick for a box. 

"Here, John," she said, "Is something to eat, 

And here are your knitted socks. 

Be careful of colds, John, be careful, 

And pray when the night time has come; 

But when the call comes to go forward 

Don't feel that praying time's done." 

Father, he came with tobacco 
And a pipe he bought from a store 

28 



EROM THE TRENCHES 



While nearer and nearer the music came 

Such as I never had heard before. 

Mary came in from the garden 

And gave John a picture on tin, 

While a tear fell on Mary's sorrowing face 

As if giving it were a sin. 

The soldiers were nearing the house now ; 

Our John seemed to back away. 

"Now look here, father and mother," he said, 

"I'm not going off to stay. 

Some day, I'll be coming home again 

For I am your only son. 

Just give me a chance to help the boys 

Keep the enemy on the run." 

In the open door stood a bent old man 

As John marched away — and then — 

A mother swooned on the garden path, 

And Mary marched on with the men. 

The boys in the tree-tops cheered and cheered ; 

The bands played a merry tune; 

A little while — and night came down, — 

Some nights always come too soon. 

After the noise of a flickering day 
The silent village slept. 
But the little house on the trampled road 
Knew watchful eyes that wept, 

29 



ItiEAftT MESSAGES 



Till the child that rode on the swaying gate 
Crept silently down the stair. 
"Look through the night," the child exclaimed, 
"See ! our flag is waving there. 

"John's on the road to Yonder Town. 

Why must you always sigh? 

Don't you know the flag is drooping 

When a hero great must die. 

The flag's in the air, I say to you, 

For Mary and I, up there 

Have knelt by the window-seat and prayed 

For our soldiers everywhere. 

"Tomorrow, you'll hear the church-bells ring, 

You'll kneel at the altar rail, 

You'll ask of Him, who bore a cross 

To help, and He will not fail. 

Then some day the soldiers will come again ; 

Our John will be marching brave. 

That day, you'll be proud you had a son 

Who could his country save. 

"What good are sons? What good are flags? 
If fathers and mothers grieve 
Because their sons take a hero's part, 
In a land we all must leave. 
Would you rather he'd sit by a sodden stream 
And bask in a noon-day sun 

30 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



Or have your boy defend the land ' 

Of which he has always sung? 

"Would you have the song in the hero's heart, 

Come to his pallid lips, 

As he gives his life for his native land 

Or live, and grudge, as he sips 

The wine that flows from hero's deeds 

As he boasts of the battle-air? 

Look up at your flag! as it looks at you, 

And read what is written there." 

YOU SHOULD SEE THE OTHER 
PICTURE 

(Translated from the French.) 

By Rev. Francis J. Henning. 

i 

The road to Paris is — not yet 
The road to Paris shall — not be 
The road to Paris is — not wet 
With the blood of a would-be enemy. 

Have just returned here from Paris. Left 
many German helmets with French relatives 
and friends. I have as yet my two legs and 
my two arms for which I greatly rejoice, 

31 



HEART MESSAGES 



knowing how badly legs and arms are needed 
for work at the present time. If I retain 
them, I mean to carry back to Paris more 
helmets and good news for my many friends, 
all in the same bundle. 

The carnage here is terrible and every man 
will shudder, thinking on it in years to come. 
At the present time, however, carnage is 
necessary and we mean France and the whole 
civilized world to approve. This place has 
been scratched with shells and red with liquid 
fire until we have become accustomed to the 
roar and quite familiar with the light. You 
should see the other picture when the ground 
is carpeted with the dead. Naturally we 
soldiers do not enjoy killing but — what will 
you — when the barbarians leave their own 
nest and come over here meaning to crush the 
life out of their betters? I am not a linguist. 
I am a French soldier and I mean to be a 
French soldier until — adieu. 

From Verdun. 



32 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



A Paper and a Book 

Lord Kitchener came through today to look 
the boys over. Two of my comrades have been 
ill and one of the fellows was reading to his 
comrade "Von Hindenburg's March into 
London." 

Lord Kitchener came unexpectedly. "What 
are you reading?" he asked in the kindly tone 
he always uses if any of the fellows are ill. 

My comrade felt confused. "Oh, your 
Lordship," he said in a stammering manner, 
"this — is — only — a book." 

"And you?" said his Lordship, noting the 
paper in the hand of the other fellow. 

"It's only something that was sent to me 
by an English friend over in Flanders," he 
said, as he handed Lord Kitchener the paper. 

I noticed how my two comrades had be- 
come nervous, and both watched Lord Kit- 
chener's face anxiously as he read the paper 
through. 

It was an anxious moment, even for me, for 
I did not like to see my friends get in wrong 
with his Lordship. I guess you know Lord 
Kitchener is a great War Lord over here and 

33 



HEART MESSAGES 



every one looks up to him as one of the great- 
est men in all the world. We all breathed 
fresh air when Lord Kitchener had finished 
reading and we heard him say : 

"Fine. Congratulate the author for me." 

He slowly folded the paper, and as he did 
so we noticed a strange, determined look come 
into his eyes. 

"The Koad to Yonder Town it shall be," he 
said slowly, as he handed the paper back to 
my comrade. "It shall not be 'Von Hinden- 
burg's March into London.' " 

As he walked away we fellows looked at 
each other in silent astonishment. "He must 
have eyes in every pore of his skin," the fel- 
low with the book whispered. "How could 
he know I was reading 'Von Hindenburg's 
March into London' when the book is covered 
by a thick brown paper?" 

From the Doncaster Training Camp. 

I Tried to Turn a Tune 

I'm not wounded, except by a trouble in my 
heart. I try at times to turn a tune but not a 
tune will come to the pipes in my throat, for 

34 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



lately the rust seems to have gotten into them. 
Where's the man just now who isn't choked 
up with the doings in a world that seems 
anxious to stand on its head. It isn't the 
funny act it's doing either, even if the dress it 
wears is bright red. 

We're getting ready to go out — but out 
where — we don't know. I was to be mar- 
ried a month ago and here I am getting my 
feet ready to be poked into a dirty unhealthy 
trench as I keep my eyes in a good bulge look- 
ing for the dirty scamps who want to get at 
us as much as we want to get at them. 

Maybe with the black of this lead pencil, 
I'm now making the mourning border around 
my own death lines. 

She wanted to marry me before I came here, 
but I said, "No — maybe you'll be better off if 
I leave you to something better than to be the 
widow of a corpse." 

This war in the long run is sure to be worse 
on the poor women than it will be on the 
men. 

Men love to fight but the women run from 
it. Just now they must run into it, for they 

35 



HEART MESSAGES 



must bind up and make good what the men 
rip up and destroy. 

There is entirely too much Hell in the 
liquid that Germany is throwing out on 
decent men at the present time. A decent 
Irishman's blood boils at the thought of the 
can filled with the liquid fire, and it's myself 
would like to turn the can upside down and 
make every mother's son of them drink from 
the liquid that was brewed in Hell. 
From the Training Camp in Gurrogh Kildare. 



The Wheel of Peaceful Days 

If we fellows had a wagonload of ice, be- 
lieve me it would be as precious to us as dia- 
monds would have been in peaceful days 
Often our throats are hot and parched and 
our heads seem to be burning as if the enemy 
had sneaked inside of us and lit a flame. One 
day not long ago a fellow came up to me with 
a dazed look in his eyes and asked me if I 
thought he had been drinking liquid fire. I 
tell you the fellows here go through enough 
to set them wild. Wounded men, red stains, 

36 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



the night watch for the enemy, — and we wait, 
— we watch, — we suffer. 

We know that every move that will be made 
by the enemy will be a sneak move and natur- 
ally we are on the defence all the time. Don't 
think we fellows fail to appreciate all the 
things done for us by our nation and by our 
friends, nevertheless, here in the grinding 
mud, and here also in the eagerness with 
which men shed their clothes for new ones as 
their tainted garments go into the acid pit, I 
can tell you men need all their courage to 
keep on enduring. Our glorious soldiers 
sometimes in talking ask themselves if the 
whole thing is an awful dream, or can it be 
reality that has turned the wheel of peaceful 
days and brought to decent manhood horrors 
indescribable? Yet the nation that is re- 
sponsible for this condition in a civilized cen- 
tury sings a song they call — Kultur. 

We feel sure that some poor fellows have 
gone to their grave before life was fully ex- 
tinct. I, myself, was glad to see a fair youth 
of twenty-one breathe his last breath after he 
had been terribly wounded. He seemed to 

37 



HEART MESSAGES 



have a horror of being taken a prisoner by the 
Germans. Before he died he said : "Oh, what 
a terrible earthquake is war." 

I thought how well his words expressed 
this awful conflict. You who are too far away 
to hear the roar of the artillery or the groans 
of suffering men should thank your God. 

Many of us fellows wish your nation were 
nearer to us. Someone said, your nation is 
not prepared for war. Well, if that is true, 
millions of your wasted dollars should be 
melted into cannons strong enough to say to a 
would-be bully nation: "I am ready to meet 
you or to aid other nations not loving a 
fiendish war." 

The greatest peace is, — Strength. Who 
ever saw an ordinary man foolish enough to 
kick a pugilist? The ordinary man wisely 
knows just how small a potato he really is 
and he keeps himself busy trying to look re- 
spectful, as he gazes on the iron muscles that, 
if necessary, could teach him a lesson concern- 
ing the wisdom of keeping in his proper place. 

I feel it in my bones that an attack is near, 
and I am glad, for anything is better than 

38 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



thinking. We want to get at it and every 
man is only too eager to do his own part I 
suppose you know England is better equipped 
than she was a year ago. Germany was well 
ready to do the killing act and England was 
forced to meet her with her own tools. 



THE NATION'S CALL 

Where you lead, a Nation follows, 
Hark ! I hear a beating drum, 
Are the soldiers coming, Mother? 
God! They are — ah — let them come. 

I am ready, — you are ready, 
You're the mother of a man. 
Hear the music calling, Mother? 
Make us cowards, — ye, — who can. 

In the camp-fire, — by the hill-side, 
Pictures, I will paint of you, 
There, I'll see you kneeling, Mother, 
Thanking God, your boy is true. 

Hear them? They are coming, Mother! 
You'll not weep, for Glory's Call ; 
You're a mother, I, a soldier, 
On us, — Nations rise or fall. 
39 



HEART MESSAGES 



I'll be watchful. Good-bye, Mother, 
See ! I knew you would be strong, 
Smile at me, from out your window, 
And I'll take your smile along. 

Where you lead, a Nation follows, 
Hark! — The echoes die away, 
As a woman's heart is hiding 
In a smile she gave that day. 



The Cathedral at Eheims 

You want to know what I am doing and of 
the things I have seen. Ah! are you a child 
or a grown-up to imagine a man in this war 
tall enough to be able to look down and tell 
you all the things he has seen? All? Why 
years and years would not be big enough to 
hold all the things that have happened. I 
have lived half a century in a very short time. 
I will, however, tell you a little about the 
destruction of the great cathedral at Rheims. 
Not long ago I witnessed it and it is in my 
memory now. I had been wounded and it was 
my last day of rest. I was standing with 
some friends not far from the cathedral, with 

40 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



my back turned to it, and suddenly I heard 
horrible noises and saw people running in all 
directions. I turned, but I did not run away, 
for I had had some experience with noises and 
the frightened people had not been on the 
firing line. 

I saw smoke coming from the broken win- 
dows,, caused by the flames inside, and I could 
hear only too well the crashing of statues and 
the crumbling walls. The low trick that 
destroyed that historic building might so well 
have been avenged on the wounded prisoners 
who at the time were lying on the floor of the 
cathedral. 

For hundreds of years, — seven hundred 
years or more — that cathedral had been the 
pride of the French people, and no words can 
describe their anguish as they looked on the 
tragedy. The cathedral had been given as a 
refuge for wounded Germans and was filled 
with them at the time of which 1 write. 

I can hardly explain the sight as it was. I 
cannot exactly tell how it all happened. The 
disaster came like a bolt from the blue and 
the German shells had done their work. 

41 



HEART MESSAGES 



Tke French people stood outside of the 
cathedral, many of them weeping as they 
witnessed the destruction of the shrine that 
had been theirs in which to worship and 
which was in a way the pride of the French 
nation. 

The men outside of the cathedral, hearing 
the crashing statues and seeing the walls 
breaking and knowing that the wonderful 
paintings inside were being demolished, sud- 
denly grew frantic and many of them called 
loudly for vengeance on the German prisoners 
who were lying helpless and maimed on the 
cathedral floor. 

I forgot everything but the mighty sight 
before my eyes, and terrible as it was, it was 
also wonderful to behold, for the attitude of 
the French people was marvelous and I 
thought at the time that the French must 
have gem-set hearts, for let me tell you, no 
other nation on the face of the earth could 
have suffered as they suffered and yet allow 
their tortured minds an opening where reason 
might enter. 

Outside the cathedral the French people 

42 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



listened as a voice suddenly called to them 
"Burn the prisoners inside the cathedral. Let 
their bones be in the ruins of their own work. 
This is their message to a House of God." 

"Burn them! Kill them!" came back the 
murmurs, "Yes, kill them — kill them, — kill 
them!" 

Then a voice was heard above the multi- 
tude: "They are wounded men inside that 
House of God. Remember you and I are 
Frenchmen." 

The cathedral doors were opened and the 
maimed and helpless Germans were being 
carried outside. The people did not heed the 
voice and, almost insane with grief, many of 
them rushed forward. Then a priest was 
seen standing on the upper steps of the 
cathedral, his pale face wet with the tears 
that had fallen from his eyes. 

"My people," he cried, "in God's holy name, 
stop until you hear my words ! Remember we 
are Frenchmen. When you remember French- 
men, you recall that for all time Frenchmen 
have known what chivalry means. Remember 
those wounded men were resting inside the 

43 



HEART MESSAGES 



House of God. Kemember we cannot be as 
the horde who have brought this ruin to 
our feet, but we know we are Frenchmen and 
we know that Frenchmen trust in God, and 
in the ruins of His House that our enemies 
have caused, we will kneel and pray." 

Suddenly the anger of the people seemed in 
a measure to be restrained and many heads 
were bowed, while others looked on and wept. 
But the wounded Germans were allowed to 
go to safety, and the French seeing the men 
pass, were seen to struggle with their emo- 
tions. 

One beautiful young Frenchwoman drew 
off her cloak and placed it over the form of a 
wounded German. He smiled up into her eyes, 
but she turned away. An old man placed his 
silk handkerchief over the face of a wounded 
soldier as pieces of plaster came down through 
the air. One old Frenchwoman sobbed as she 
watched the wounded German soldiers being 
carried to safety. 

"I was the mother of five boys myself," she 
said, "and bad as these are, they are some 
mother's boys after all." But as the German 

44 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



soldiers went on, the cathedral was burning 
and soon we were all ordered back to a safer 
position. 

Are you satisfied with my explanation? 
No? Neither am I. I can't explain it be- 
cause it is like a great tragedy that might 
have come only in dreams, nightmare dreams 
that would leave shudders in one's nerves for 
years to come. The great historic cathedral 
was in ruins. The grief of the French people 
will be lasting. I love the French people. 
They can be so gay — the gayest people in all 
the world — and they can turn from gayety 
and accept awful sacrifice as their hands trem- 
ble to strangle. At such times they can know 
self-control and I have seen them spare ene- 
mies who showed them nothing but treachery 
of the studied type. You see, there are some 
types of people who still believe that all is 
fair in love and in war. But with the civilized 
people — with the French people, for instance 
— that quotation did not hold good, since it 
did not seem fair to let the maimed German 
soldiers burn in their own temple of worship. 

France. 
45 



HEART MESSAGES 



Letter from the Scotch Lassie 

I received a letter from a Scotch Lassie and 
back of my wee bump of thought there is a 
feeling to tell you about it, for in that letter 
you will find something far more interesting 
than if I were to write merely concerning 
myself. I know — and you know — the world 
loves a lover, and you don't know my Lassie's 
name, so I can write of her for the glory I 
feel in the doing of it and for the glory of Old 
Scotland and for the pride she has planted 
in my heart from the first day she came into 
my life. 

She is only twenty years old and she has 
spent seven years out of her short twenty 
living in Germany with an aunt who married 
a German. 

I cannot answer her letter as I would like 
to, because I have not her flowing rivers of 
thought, and that bump of thought in my 
head makes me wish you were here to give 
me a wee hint or two as to the things worth 
saying, so that the Lassie herself might think 
I came half way to meet her at least. I got 
sick and my head reels at the thought of 

46 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



writing to her, for when I do write to her it 
will be the first letter she has ever received 
from me, and I'll be in a bad way if she finds 
out concerning stiff brains that won't move 
as smartly as her own. 

I want you to know things she wrote me 
because you might send me a thought that 
will help. She wrote me this : 

"Kobert, when I was in Germany I was 
surprised to see that the very first things in 
the way of toys that are given to German boys 
are guns, soldiers, soldier suits, and various 
kinds of cannon, to say nothing of the swords 
and books about soldiers fighting. From the 
cradle to manhood the boy is taught to fight. 
When he is a man he is turned into some- 
thing like a sheep because he must follow the 
word of his Emperor ; whether that word be a 
foolish one or a wise one makes but little dif- 
ference. 

"While I was in Germany, my Uncle, al- 
though he was a well-meaning industrious 
man, was filled to the brim with but one am- 
bition. He wanted his boys to live long 
enough to be drilled as perfect soldiers. My 

47 



HEART MESSAGES 



Aunt, who was his wife, and to whom he owed 
his success in life, was always brushed away 
as a fly might be when she ventured an opinion 
contrary to anything German. I never could 
make up my mind why my Uncle married my 
Aunt, and I was convinced he took keen de- 
light in insulting her about the land of her 
birth. 

"The Germans are nearly all specialists and 
consequently they see only through the nar- 
row groove of their choice. They make won- 
derful surgeons, and I have often thought that 
the reason of this is that there is a great 
streak of the brutal in their natures, giving 
them courage and scope to make ventures that 
often lead to success. They love Shakespeare 
• — and after a long study of the German 
nature, I realized that their love of Shake- 
speare was because of his tragic style. 

"War paintings they consider best in the 
world of Art, and uncanny music appeals to 
them, such as the noisy Wagnerian type. 

"I always knew from toasts that were given 
and from things that were said that the 
Kaiser's dream has always been to strengthen 

48 * 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



the German throne out of the remnants he 
meant to make, if possible, of thrones the 
world over. 

"I sometimes feel sorry for the German 
soldiers and the German civilians for that 
which is in them has been put there by years 
of drilling and instilled into their minds by 
the Kaiser's teaching." 

This is what my Scotch Lassie wrote in her 
letter. I cannot tell you more even though I 
know you would like to know everything she 
said. 

I know you are hearing news of us here, so 
will not write more, and will only add that 
this Scotch Lassie has seven cousins in the 
famous Black Watch and she is a happy proud 
one with the knowledge of it. Some day I 
hope that the smoke of battle will grow 
ashamed and go away, and when that day 
comes — if I still have my eyes, I hope to see 
the face of a wee girl, — for it is tnat face I 
dream of here under the stars, and it is that 
face which is always framed for me between 
the sunrise and the sunset. 

France. 
49 



HEART MESSAGES 



My Mother Was Always Around. 
Dear Friend — 

Some of us poor Johnnies here wish we had 
learned more when we were at school. Here 
we are all the time wanting to say fine things 
and no hole seems to open up in our heads to 
let the good thoughts out. Maybe if we get a 
head wound it will help open the way a bit to 
let out what we want to say. Smart fellows 
write big letters. Some of them keep right 
on at one letter for a long time. My mother 
got a neighbor to write me before she died. 
She told me not to worry about not getting 
home to her, that I was needed worse out here. 

All the fellows write big letters, and now 
since my mother is gone it makes me feel blue 
and I think I tell you all this just because 
a woman's heart is kind and can understand. 

I used to live in a nice little house with a 
garden. It had four rooms in it and my 
mother was always around. She said it was 
right for me to come here, and I guess it was, 
for my father agreed with her. 

They took her to a hospital and she talked 
all the time about me before she died. 

50 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



This war is drawing to its top-notch and I 
believe it will be a slow going down on the 
other side of the hill for the Germans. Maybe 
I won't be glad to get back home ! But I guess 
I won't feel very good, not seeing my mother 
waiting for me at the door. Next to our house 
and at the house across the street, fellows left 
with me when I came here, but no one has 
died in their homes. I guess death is all 
right when it comes, but not when it takes 
away a fellow's mother or father, his wife or 
his child, but then I guess that makes up a 
fellow's whole world. 

I hope you never will get into war, for you 
cannot dream of it as it is. We hope it will 
soon end and then we will take a long rest 
and I will go back to my lonely father and 
help to brighten his life. 

Flanders. 

A Little Father at Thirteen. 

(Translated by Eev. Francis J. Henning) 

We are not unthankful, for we pray. Peo- 
ple who are unthankful do not always pray, 

51 



HEART MESSAGES 



for they do not always feel like offering 
thanks, because they want more. 

My brother is alive, my father is alive, and 
I try to be a good little father to my father, 
because my mother is dead and I know it 
would please her, because she always said I 
was a little man. 

Everyone is glad to have a mother dead 
now. I used to cry so much, but I cry no 
more. I am thirteen and thankful that my 
father and brother's lives have been spared 
and because my mother's eyes are closed and 
she cannot see. 

My father is very old, and my brother had 
a hurt when we were leaving Belgium. He 
was helping two soldiers who were wounded. 
One was a German soldier and one was a Bel- 
gian soldier. I am glad my father and my 
brother are alive because not all my friends 
are alive now. When my brother's hurt was 
mended he went away and he is now in a deep 
hole in the ground in Flanders. They call 
the hole a trench. I am now wearing an 
American boy's clothes, and I will remember 
it when I am as old as my father, and he is 

52 



EROM THE TRENCHES 



seventy-eight years old now. The boys and 
girls here pray for peace to come and they 
pray for the boys and girls in America. I 
want very mnch to see Belgium again. I had 
a nice dog and I am afraid he is dead now. 
I am glad I can write this letter, because I 
was told I could write it as a reward. 

I borrowed a lead pencil from a good man 
here. He told me to write my best and I am 
trying to do it. I hope you will like it. 

Some day, if I live to grow* big like my 
brother, I will come to America, and I will 
then thank everybody in your country for 
what they have done for' the boys and girls 
of Belgium. When Belgium is made new 
again it may be your people will go there. 
Your people are such good people and they 
would love our King. He is a beautiful King 
and he is a good King. He will have us home 
again when he is allowed to have us. We 
will always remember your country, and when 
I am confirmed I am going to take for my 
name the name of your country. I have a 
picture of America in a book at home, but I 
am afraid the book is burned up now. Our 

53 



HEART MESSAGES 



house was burned down. I am going back to 
Belgium some day and I can find the spot 
where my house was, as there were two little 
trees right beside it. Across the way from our 
house there were two trees, and one of them 
was very crooked. Please come to my country 
some day and see all the boys and the girls, 
and when your people come from your coun- 
try to ours, our boys and girls will sing for 
them, and they will sing very good, I am sure. 
From the Belgian Refugee Camp in Holland. 

My Brother Dick 

Your very touching letter was handed to me 
this evening by our Sergeant, who thought 
it might afford me some comfort after the loss 
of my brother. It has done me a lot of good 
to read it, because I feel that the boys out here 
have your prayers and your sympathy, and it 
is a comfort to know that we also have the 
good wishes and the sympathy of so many of 
the women of your country. 

My poor brother Dick was killed last week 
in the big fight we had when we stormed and 
carried the German trenches. We had been 

54 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



preparing ourselves for this ordeal for some 
days before, and our officers were satisfied 
that every man knew what was expected of 
him and was prepared to do it. You can 
imagine our nervousness and our excitement 
while our artillery was shelling the German 
trenches in preparation for our attack. 

It was to be our first actual experience of 
hand-to-hand fighting, and we were all won- 
dering how we would come out. Our great- 
est fear was not that we would be knocked 
out, but that we would not be able to live up 
to the splendid reputation that our Canadian 
boys have earned in France as the equal of 
any of the crack British regulars. 

At last the artillery fire ceased, and almost 
on that instant we got the word to charge. 
Over the parapet we charged, every one trying 
to be first, and dashed forward toward the 
German trenches. Their wire entanglements, 
although badly damaged, took us a few mo- 
ments to get through, and all that time we 
were under a heavy machine gun fire. We 
broke through at last, and the next moment 
we were at the edge of the German trenches, 

55 



HEART MESSAGES 



and hurling bombs down upon its defenders, 
who soon commenced to throw up their hands 
and cry — "Cowards !" 

The taking of the second trench was easy, 
and we got it with but little additional loss. 
It was all over in ten minutes and the trenches 
were ours. We at once commenced to make 
good our position by building up the trenches 
on the side next to the Germans so that 
we could resist the counter attack which 
invariably follows the capture of the enemy's 
trenches. This attack did not take place, why, 
T do not know. 

As soon as we possibly could, we hunted 
around to find out how many of us had been 
wounded or knocked out. Not more than half 
of our platoon were on their feet and we did 
all we could to get the wounded men where 
they could receive medical attention. 

I found my poor brother lying almost at 
the edge of the German trench, — but he was 
dead. A bullet had struck him almost in the 
center of his forehead and I don't suppose he 
knew what killed him, so sudden was the 
call. Poor Dick, — only twenty-one, and as 

56 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



fine a young athlete as ever donned khaki. 
His was one of the loveliest characters I ever 
knew. He was as gentle as a woman, and yet 
in the cause of right he could be as bold as a 
lion. He didn't know what fear was, and he 
was always ready for any risky service that re- 
quired a volunteer. Mother didn't want us 
both to enlist, as we two were all the boys she 
had, and our Dick was her pet and the apple 
of ,her eye. 

I enlisted in the Eaton Machine Gun Bat* 
tery and afterwards you couldn't hold Dick 
back. The first thing I knew he was beside 
me in the same battery. We came to England 
with the brigade and were afterwards as- 
signed to the Mc Naught Battery, one of the 
four batteries forming the Eaton Brigade. 

There did not seem to appear to be much 
chance of our getting to the front with our 
armored motor cars as long as trench fight- 
ing continued, and we were exchanged into 
one of the infantry battalions that were being 
sent to the front. Soon we were there and in 
the trenches. 

Dick was the life and soul of our platoon, 

57 



HEART MESSAGES 



and I think that every man felt pretty nearly 
as bad about his death as I did, for he was 
always doing kindly acts for everyone. 

We buried poor Dick that night behind our 
reserve trenches, and when our chaplain read 
the burial service, there wasn't a dry eye in 
our little party. There was a smile on Dick's 
face and I kissed his dead lips so as to send 
it to dear mother, thinking maybe it miglit 
be a comfort to her to get it and to know that 
her fine boy died doing his duty to his coun- 
trv, and I felt it would give her some comfort 
too, to know that her boy died without any 
pain. 

The night before he was killed, he and I 
were talking in our dugout and he said, "You 
know, Bob, I am twenty-one now and a man." 
I shall always remember him, my great, big, 
strong brother, the boy who acted a man's 
part, and who helped to win over two lines 
of German trenches. 

Good kid he was, and good kids get their 
reward in Heaven. 

We have lost a lot of the best and bravest 
boys we had, but they all died as soldiers 

58 



PROM THE TRANCHES 



want to die, and please' God, we will get 
them all back again. When we attack the 
German trenches the next time, God willing, 
we will win. Somewhere in France. 



"Mr., Mrs., Master, Miss, 
Listen, while I tell you this" : 

The above lines were two lines from 
a comic poem I had written and sent 
to a soldier. He quotes from it in 
his answer. In the same letter I asked 
him for a description of war as it ap- 
peared to him. The Author. 



When He Thinks You an Easy Mark. 

Mr., Mrs., Master, Miss, 
• Listen, while I tell you this": 

The Devil wanted excitement. He knocked 
hard at the door of the earth and the world 

59 



HEABT MESSAGES 

called it, — earthquake. In some places the 

earth caved in, so anxious was it to go to meet 

the caller. In other places people ran around 

wild and others looking on called it "Brain 

storm." People glared at each other as steel 

flashed, and they listened for the roar of the 

guns and the weird ploughing of the artillery. 

Others stood with hanging jaw and eyes glued 

to the open mouth of the dry earth that was 

thirsty for the gore of men. It got it. It 

drank it, and while snow came and covered 

it up and rain fell and thunder called loud to 

the quick-going lightning, men moaned as 

they looked on their torn bodies, while others 

were sent by others to the big hole where the 

bodies of men are received before they decay. 

Trees fell and men hid in deep holes while 

women turned away to cry for fear their men 

would lose a man's courage. Little children 

laughed at the coming soldiers and danced for 

the music that was going to bluff them into 

becoming orphans. Men fought like devils, 

and afterwards were glad they did, for they 

believed they had a devil as an opponent. All 

this is only a little like war as it is. Do not 

60 



FROM THE TRENCHES 

be too hard on the fighting men, and do not 
christen them brutes. When a neighbor in- 
sists on kicking you behind your back, and 
when you let him off, when he thinks you an 
easy mark, then he soon gets to taking more 
liberties from your generosity to him. Then 
he spits at you from long range. It is then 
time to powder his face with the puff he is 
trying to give to his betters. 

The Devil was getting lonely. He whispered 
into the ear of a likely friend and the rumble 
started, for the Devil knows well his own 
starting place. This is only one man's idea 
of war. 

I saw a dead comrade lying on the battle- 
field with his mouth wide open while the rain 
was falling into it and the earth drank his 
blood. All the time the organ of the artillery 
played a dirge for the man who had gone. 

One day in the hospital I heard a man pray- 
ing when it was near the morning hour. I 
know something of medicine, but the whole 
scene in the hospital was on my nerves and 
I felt I would rather be on the firing line than 
looking on at those pain-racked cots. 

61 



HEAUT MESSAGES 



I asked one sick man why lie prayed so 
fervently when he was sick. 

"Oh, I don't know," he said, "Maybe it ain't 
fear and maybe it is. At home prayin' was 
dear, for we were taxed to keep goin' and a 
feller has pride sometimes, and if he can't give 
to keep np a church, he feels ashamed and 
sneaks away. It costs nothing here to pray, 
so we turn to it." 

As I write I can hear the French guns as 
they battle for the railway not far away. The 
soldiers are lined up to do the real thing and, 
believe me, they will do it, and I believe the 
war will come to an end sooner than anyone 
imagines. This infernal hot pot that is stew- 
ing the flesh and blood of men cannot end too 
soon. If you know the British people do you 
not think the British Government has been 
marvelous, getting together four million men 
in less than two years? That is what had to 
be done when the Devil was wagging his tail 
into the faces of nations and daring them to 
come forward face to face. I am afraid I am 
taking liberties with His Majesty the King 
of Evil's name. 

62 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



You are kind, so you will pardon me, be- 
cause sometimes the fellows feel desperate 
when, with a far-off look in their eyes, they 
see a home where people are inside looking 
through a window fearing, yet hoping, for 
news. When I think of them I must stop 
writing. Men are looking on, and men who 
mean to be real men will not have the dew 
in their eyes when each one of us is fighting 
hard to give, each man to his pal, a little sun- 
shine from his own tortured heart. 

France. 



A Brave Soldier is the Grandest Work 

While I wonder why I write, the answer 
comes, and I know I write because many of us 
have been comforted and some have been 
amused — an unusual thing in these dark aw- 
ful days. It would be odd if I expected to 
escape being killed here. I do not expect to 
escape, as death is showing her ugly teeth at 
us at* every turn. 

If you have steady nerves and a stout heart, 
you should see us as we are. A few days ago 

63 



HEART MESSAGES 



the battle was raging and it was a Hell battle, 
take my word for that! The Germans piled 
their corpses high and made them into bar- 
racks as our brave suffering fellows made of 
themselves a stone wall that refused to give 
way to the enemy even when the enemy in- 
creased their artillery, and for a time worked 
on, through deafness that was caused by the 
mighty roar in our ears. My brother and four 
of my cousins are going somewhere north, 
where they expect to do great work and where 
they mean to take a lot of trenches before they 
take a rest. Across the German line, thou- 
sands of men have retreated or have been 
killed or taken prisoners. I think a great 
many of our men have been more or less 
wounded, but many of them won't admit it, 
because they are afraid they might have to 
retire, and most of them want to keep right 
on and see this war to a finish. 

Not far away on the German side, I am told, 
there is an old ruin where Germans are hiding, 
biding their time to get at us if we forget to 
keep our eyes on them. But few of us need 
the use of glasses to keep our eyes their way, 

64 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



for we know they are looking for us and will 
come when we least expect them. 

This place belongs to the soldiers — nearly 
all the civilians have gone away. When a 
civilian is seen it is nearly always a man who 
comes back looking for something he is afraid 
is lost, but as a usual thing he leaves faster 
than he came, for what he finds is only de- 
struction, caused by the desperate shelling by 
the enemy. 

The Australian soldiers are wonderful men. 
Do you know any Australian soldiers? If you 
do, you can afford to be proud of them. When 
the Germans get near the Australian boys 
they get such a surprise party it takes them 
right off their feet, ripping the leather in their 
boots with the shock. When the Australian 
boys go back home their country will have no 
cause to be anything but mighty proud of the 
boys the war sends home and of those who 
remain here, for she can always recall with 
pride the sons who fell asleep fighting this 
great cause. 

I wish you could see the war kitchens. But 
I won't tell you about them now, for to me a 

65 



HEABT MESSAGES 



brave soldier is the grandest work of all, and 
as I peep out of my shell pit, I sometimes 
wonder why I was made a soldier, because I 
feel small when I see other men so much 
greater than myself. 

You should see the great leaders of this war. 
Talk about old-time war leaders. I tell you 
the men of today are greater than the men 
we have read about in our school histories. 
With all their greatness they always have 
time to think of the comforts of others, and 
the whole mix-up shows in their faces. It is 
wonderful to be like those men, for they win 
for themselves and they win for everyone else, 
and to have their names go down in the his- 
tory of the future is a small reward for so 



much bigness. 



There Ain't Much Fun for Sale. 

"Don't run away," he said to me. 
As if I could. 

"Don't run away," he said again. 
As if I would. 

66 



France. 



EROM THE TRENCHES 



"You just stay here, right where you're at. 
Have you no soul? 
You just keep peeking for the cause 
That put our feet in this mud-hole." 

"Shut up !" I hollered back at him. 
He did it then. 

"You keep your tongue inside your lips." 
"I hadn't ast your words 'n when 
You know as much as me 
Maybe you'll think 'n try t' grow. 
Folks as push 'ard their 'orns are weak, 
For hot-air talk is only blow." 

When you wrote those lines we laughed 
hard with fun, for it fixed a lot of the jolly 
pippins when they got to blowing. A little 
nonsense, I say, is good sense in trench times, 
when there ain't much fun for sale, a little 
comes in good, especially if a fellow is laid 
up in the hospital, like I am now, and knows 
that he has lost a limb. 

But I say, a lost limb ain't the whole tree, 
so I am trying to keep up and am hobbling 
along and soon hope to be out of the hospital. 
I suppose the best I can do now, as long as I 
live, is to limp. Every blooming soul I cared 

67 



HEART MESSAGES 



for died since I went to war. My mother, she 
fretted and soon gave it all up. My sister, 
she took a dose by mistake, thinking it would 
make her sleep, because she fretted about 
Ma and me. She never woke. And my girl has 
gone and married a better man, but I don't 
think so, as I was wild about her. Now, when 
she sees me all broke up she will be glad she 
took the other man, as X certainly do look 
awful, — and if you are kind at heart .you will 
understand how I hate to have her, all the 
gladder she took him when she sees me. 

I am trying to laugh all the time, for I have 
it in my head that maybe the laughing will 
frighten the horrors away. For, say, didn't 
the noise of the war send things that chased 
the lads up and made a heap of difference in 
the most of them. Then I say, why can't the 
noise of laughing make things happen too. 

I can get to a good many places yet, on one 
leg, and if I'm not wanted one place I can 
try another, and if I ain't wanted no place 
maybe some day I can get a place at a railway 
station, for I can call out great, and if I can't 



68 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



travel I can watch other people go, and that's 
the next thing to traveling, ain't it? 

I ain't poor, for I have eleven pounds and 
things for a room, and I am thinking about 
going to my mother's and my sister's grave. 
But when I get thinking about my mother 
I just wonder if she will know anything about 
my crutches. I hope she won't, because she 
was awful afraid of men on crutches. My 
little sister was a beauty, but she was feeling 
too blue for the world. Fellows must keep 
trying to laugh, for I say misery is a twin to 
misery, and so I try to bluff it and make my- 
self think that some day I am going to be glad. 
War is awful. It ain't Hell, — it's HelFs own 
damnation, with the Devil laughing at the 
overflow. 

Say, where has Peace gone? For God's 
sake and for the sake of the boys, if you know 
where it's hiding pull it out and send it our 
way. But if it ain't to be got, get 'em to put 
steam on the war and end it by doing it up 
quick instead of stretching out the agony into 
indies, for a man's got feelings and somehow 
men can't shake off feeling, and life only gives 

69 



HEART MESSAGES 



a fellow once his legs and his arms and his 
eyes. 

Say, get us Peace or give us more War. 
, London Hospital. 



Many a Modern Homer or Bobby Burns 

Some people are shabby enough to say we 
soldiers are fighting in the dark and that we 
know nothing of what it's all about. I say to 
those people that they are telling great un- 
truths, — untruths that are big enough to 
choke their voices. 

A soldier, even a fellow who may not know 
his letters, soon gets into the heart of things, 
and he often sees better than many a man 
outside of the war line who is doing nothing 
but trying to talk wisely. 

Let a man starve awhile ; let him get enough 
cuts and bruises ; let him face the shotgun, and 
don't you think, even if he has a thick head, 
it will thin down a little and he will ask ques- 
tions concerning what it is all about? Many 
a fellow here speaks half a dozen languages 
and many have wonderful minds in other 

70 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



directions. Let me tell you it is still the hut 
or the attic for many a modern Homer or 
Bobby Burns. You should hear the fellows 
tell things in the simple way in which 
it seems to roll right off their minds, — 
little Belgium, for instance, and the big King 
that reigns over a small people. Then I wish 
you could hear them when they get busy and 
hear the cutting way in which they meet the 
German scythe. You should hear their de- 
scription of the brutality, of the cutting off of 
children's hands, of the manner in which 
women were driven on ahead at the point of 
the gun while the men were shot as they came 
on behind. 

About thirty thousand Canadians have been 
killed. I belong to the Princess Patricia regi- 
ment, and I tell you all the boys have been 
real wonders. The Australian fellows, too, 
have been a credit to their country as well as 
to themselves. We all wish the war was over, 
and there are/ times when we feel like men 
half-mad and half-glad, — mad that decent men 
are forced to meet such conditions and glad 
of the prospect of taking victory back home, 

71 



HEART MESSAGES 



for if we didn't take victory we wouldn't go 
back and face our good people. If we live 
we'll take victory home, if we die the other 
boys will take it home for us. 

When I was leaving home there were great 
crowds of people on the streets. Faces looked 
out from windows and from almost every eye 
we could see the tears. Boys looked down 
upon us and they crouched in tree branches. 

I saw a dear old lady crying bitterly and I 
wanted to say a few cheerful words to her, 
but I couldn't. Near her were other women, 
and as the boys were at a standstill for a few 
minutes, I heard one of the women say : 

"Look at that poor woman crying. I guess 
she has a boy going away, poor soul !" 

The, dear old lady who was crying heard 
what was said and she replied in a low tone. 

"Yes, I have boys," she said. "Look at 
them, — they are all my boys, the whole lot of 
'em. I'm what you might call an old maid, but 
I have boys, and they have lived here in my 
heart all my life." 

Say, — a lot of fellows heard her and maybe 
we didn't send her a few kind smiles. I'll bet 

72 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



wherever she is now that angel maiden 
mother-o'-mine is thinking about us out here. 
We fellows here agree on one thing about her. 
If St. Peter isn't kind to her kind, something 
will be out of place in the heart of the keeper 
of the gate, for many a night we have talked 
about her, the dear Canadian maiden lady 
with the maternal instinct so large in her 
heart that she was able to weep for a great 
army of boys who were off to war. 

What wouldn't we give to know her ad- 
dress, and you bet we'd write her a great long 
letter if we only knew. I would ask you if 
ever you print this letter to see that it reaches 
Canada. Maybe if she sees it she'll be glad 
to know' how we feel, because it may be we 
can never return. In that way it would be 
nice to give her comfort in the knowledge that 
we understood her the day we came away and 
that we think of her in our lonely hours. 

The French Actress 

We are better off here than the fellows in 
the trenches in Flanders. 

Flanders is a low, flat, unhealthy country, 

73 



HEART MESSAGES 



as ugly as the war itself, while here in France 
there is lots of real beauty that gets into a 
fellow's eyes. I tell you a bird singing in the 
trees will now hold the attention of a man as 
never before. Isn't it odd, nature and horror 
meeting like this in a world that has become 
new to us fellows. I wonder where the world 
is rolling to? Oh, my God! I hope it ain*t 
rolling down! for what is the use of what 
people tried for if that is to be the end of it 
all. 

One day some weeks ago a French actress 
came to sing for the fellows in the trenches. 
She sang songs of our sweethearts at home, 
but soon she saw by the look in the men's faces 
that she had made a great mistake, for a lot 
of the fellows looked awful blue and some of 
the soldiers were actually in tears. 

She stopped singing abruptly and sang 
merry, hopeful tunes, and then all was 
changed as if by magic. 

After she was gone, the fellows looked at 
each other, and I can tell you there was a 
question and an answer in every man's eyes. 
The question was something like this: "Men, 

74 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



what would the world be like if there was not 
a woman in it?" And then the answer 
seemed to come: "Men, you would be worse 
than the conditions here make you." 

God bless good women everywhere, for a 
man must suffer a lot before his mind sets to 



»' 



thinking. Soldiers know women and what 
they have done for them, — the soldiers will 
always remember, — and take it from me some 
of them are a mighty lot ashamed they didn't 
know better, sooner. 

France. 

Hail to the Noble Scotchman 

Your letter made me and a lot of the soldier 
fellows laugh. What you said about putting 
on different clothes was mighty funny, be- 
cause we know all about something that hap- 
pened like that only last week. Somewhere, 
German soldiers stole out of a big woods all 
dressed up as Scotchmen. They robbed the 
dead Scots, put their clothes on and came, 
never expecting any one would know the dif- 
ference. 

Blest if Scotchmen's blood don't boil at the 

75 



HEART MESSAGES 



thought of it, for whenever did a German look 
like a Scotchman, either below the kilts or 
above 'em. 

It didn't take long for the Germans to know 
they were going to be set upon, so they faded 
away, but the kilts haven't been found yet, 
but if there are any foreigners found inside 
of 'em I'd hate to be it, knowing just what 
would happen. • 

Here's a verse I used to know : 

"Hail to the noble Scotchman 

Whether on land or sea ; 

Hail to the dear Scotch maiden 

Wherever she may be. 

Though the dead be shorn of garments 

They never can fit a foe, 

For the soul of a worthy Scotchman 

Would waken, for he would know." 

France. 

That's the Voice of Peace 

I, like many a better man, have felt the 
shock of a terrific shell. In my battalion so 
many men have succumbed to the poison of 
gas that it would be a lot better for them, as 

76 



FROM THE TBENCHES 



it may be for me, too, if we just go out and are 
forgotten. 

We have looked at the corpses of German 
soldiers and for them we have often felt a pity 
that young men of any nation should be sacri- 
ficed for a one-man greed and thirst for war. 
Sacrificed they had to be, since the war came 
on. Some of our own wonderful soldiers, 
those who have given their lives for a cause, 
we shall always know as martyrs. 

One day a big shell exploded near me and I 
remembered nothing more until I awoke some 
days later with my head bandaged and my 
throat feeling as if it were on fire. 

I had been fortunate until that shell ex- 
ploded. When I was carried to the dressing 
station they found that my right leg had been 
partly blown away. I will not explain about 
my injuries. Why should I? Didn't I come 
here to the war expecting to be injured or, if 
need be, even to be killed? Well, I am not 
dead yet, but should death come I think I 
would* be glad to welcome it, unless I can be 
assured that in the future my life can be of 
use to someone. 

77 



HEART MESSAGES 



What is to become of all the wounded men? 
Ten years from now, twenty years from now, 
what will be their fate — poor soldiers! 

A newer generation by that time will be big 
enough to look on a level into a man's eyes, 
and what will they feel? — Only repulsion. 

Wouldn't it be a grand thing before this 
generation dies if good people, who lived with 
us during those horrible times, and who were 
in a way our companions in suffering, would 
collect a fund to care for their friends in 
trouble who are unable to go on and to do 
for themselves. On their own journey toward 
the grave their purses would seem but little 
the lighter for the coins dropped from them for 
such a noble purpose, and when the tolling 
bell of the cemetery gate is reached the dole- 
ful tones would seem less mournful. 

Large calibre shells are waiting to send out 
a horrible bombardment, anxious to kill and 
to cripple good worthy men. I saw a poor 
comrade die only a short time ago. I, myself, 
had been caught by a fragment of a shell, but 
as I saw my comrade far worse off than I, 
I dragged myself to his side. I placed his 

78 



EHOM THE TRENCHES 



head on my arm and he looked into my face. 
"Ok ? God !" he said in a hoarse whisper, "have 
you chosen us to be torn even as you were 
torn?" 

I leaned over him and gave him a drink 
from my water bottle. "Is it vinegar?" he 
asked in a whisper. 

"Take it, Fred," I said to him, "it is water." 

"Who are you?" he asked, as he stared 
blankly into my face, "are you come to heal 
war with water?" 

I pressed the water to his lips and as I did 
so, from far away came the horrible roar of 
the artillery, and the dying man paused as if 
trying to listen. 

"That's the voice of Peace," he said, and he 
smiled as he breathed his last breath. I was 
glad he was dead. Over his dead body I 
thanked God who had taken him home. Later 
I found in his pocket a letter and an enclosed 
poem, upon which was written your address. 
The poem was called "The Voice of Peace." 
It had been sent him by an aged Belgian 
woman and he had evidently been reading it. 
This Belgian woman had a son who had died 

79 



HEART MESSAGES 



on the field while in action and soldiers had 
found in his dead hand the poem from which 
a copy had been made and sent to my comrade. 

I thought the coincidence unusual. You 
know the story of the poem and I feel it only 
right to let you know concerning it. 

If I have luck I expect to get an artificial 
leg. But I must wait my turn. Sometimes I 
am thinking of the boys and I wish I was 
back with them on the firing line, but here I 
am- waiting only for — a wooden leg. 

Men talk of kindness. Men teach it, im- 
press it upon the minds of the young and then 
when filled with beautiful thoughts we go out 
to encounter bursting shell and to watch men 
writhing in anguish, — how long, oh, God! 
Oh, God, how long. 

France. 

Imagining Herself to Have Been Wronged 
The German hand had fallen heavily on a 
small people. A dear old neighbor of mine in 
Belgium, an old man over eighty years of age, 
lay dying in his little home at the close of the 
fatefulday when the German soldiers marched 

80 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



through Belgium. They entered the opened 
door of the dying man's house, as all Belgian 
doors were ordered to be left open so that the 
German soldiers might enter at their will. 
The German soldiers were told that the aged 
man was dying and they were begged to allow 
the old man to die in peace. The Germans 
hesitated, — but only for a few minutes. Laugh- 
ing and whispering among themselves they 
entered the sick man's room and taking up 
the bedding on which the dying man lay, they 
carried him to the door of his little house, and 
threw him into the garden. 

In a short time the red flame of the burning 
home tapered with a red glow the dying man, 
lying on the ground. 

It is true that war must always be cruel — 
that from war nothing but cruelty can come; 
but the German idea of warfare in civilized 
days has proven to be the King of Brutality 
that would have done credit to dark ages. 

Germany has planned cruelties so barbarous 
that the imagination becomes stupefied. May 
Germany wake up in the ruins of her own 
dreams, and when she awakes may she realize 

81 



HEART MESSAGES 



that her dreams have led her into the night- 
mare she would have rejoiced in making for 
her neighbor nations. 

Only to her own people has Germany ever 
shown real appreciation. Imagining herself 
to have been wronged she has invented tor- 
tures that must have been hewed somewhere 
from the hot regions below. If the nations 
Germany has attacked would retaliate and 
use upon her some of her own tools, dealing 
out to her some of her own medicine, she 
would call loud in her thick guttural tones a 
lament against her wrongs. 

From the Belgian Refugee Camp. 

We Couldn't Help the Fright. 

It is not my fault, I hope, if what I write 
seems brutal. Hideous things have been hap- 
pening and we are asked to tell of them as 
they are. But we can't do that because there 
were so many dark deeds given to us — we 
can't exiplain them all, try as we may. So 
dark were some of those deeds that we seem to 
be blinded by the very blackness of them, for 
we cannot see and we never will be able to see 

82 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



any reason for the misery we have been called 
on to endure. Belgian people tell me that as 
long as they live they will hear the tramp of 
the German soldiers' feet as they came on and 
into their beloved country. As for me, as long 
as I live, even though my ears should grow 
deaf, I will hear that sound, and should I be- 
come blind, I shall always see the terror of 
my people during those terrible days. 

We couldn't help the fright, for the women 
and the children clung to us in terror and we 
seemed so few and so entirely unprepared. 
Soon we found we had good reason to know 
that our fright was not the fright of the 
coward, for our fright was the fright of men 
for the women of their country, for the chil- 
dren and for our country itself. Things our 
Belgian people endured will never be entirely 
understood by an outside world. Our people — 
many of them — and among the numbers were 
many women and children — were driven like 
cattle before the German soldiers, while the 
Germans followed behind hoping to shield 
themselves from the French guns. 

I saw a German soldier nimbly climb a tree 

83 



HEART MESSAGES 



and push from her hiding place a pale young 
girl of about eighteen years of age. She fell 
to the ground, much to the amusement of the 
German soldiers who were standing below 
The girl remained on the ground, unable to 
rise, and one of the German soldiers turned 
her over with his foot. Seeing that the girl 
was injured and unconscious, the soldiers 
grew impatient and passed on and away, 
leaving her on the ground. Later, she was 
carried into a farm house and there it was 
learned a bone in her head had been broken. 

The girl remained ill for many weeks and at 
present writing, she does not seem to be her- 
self mentally. Only when one speaks con- 
cerning her cousin, who is at the Kefugee 
Camp in Holland, does she show signs of 
knowing what is said to her. Last week this 
cousin wrote to her concerning the great work 
that is being done in Holland by the Rocke- 
feller Foundation and then she whispered; 
"I am very pleased it is so. Please tell every- 
body for me not to hide in a tree when the 
German soldiers are coming." 

The earth is torn for the purpose of plant- 

84 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



ing so that from the torn earth might come 
food for men. Many colored fruits ripen over- 
head before they fall from the trees on this 
very earth that sends up vegetation. Men are 
made strong by those things, and from the 
strength given, men seek to kill and to de- 
stroy. I often think of this when the rain 
comes to keep those fruits and vegetables 
alive, and when I watch the sun come down 
to warm and to ripen. Strength comes from 
gifts and from that strength too often comes 
brutality. 

Broken Belgium appreciates everything her 
benefactors have done for her, and Belgium 
believes that all who have been kind will some- 
day see their kindness bloom, if not in this 
world, then in a world where the cry of terror 
or the noise of the cannon can never enter. 
After the war is over we will try our best to 
get our families together as in the old days, 
or, at least, we hope to gather together those 
who are not lost to us entirely. I, myself, 
fell from a wound received while, with others, 
I was pleading with the German soldiers to 
allow an old man to remain in his home. I 

85 



HEART MESSAGES 



spoke too many words and am now nursing 
a bullet that is hiding somewhere in my body, 
for it cannot be found. 

I was an assistant teacher in a little school 
and to me the little children were the dearest 
things in my life. If a heart can shed tears, 
my heart has often wept thinking over their 
pretty ways and the memory of their little 
voices that comes to me even now as I think 
of them. Many of those little children, now 
orphans, have come to me, and many of them 
have come to bring me stories I cannot tell 
to you because a blot, — ink-black, cannot be 
erased by mere words. 

Some years ago I saw a play called "The 
Sign of the Cross." I was at that time travel- 
ing with an English gentleman through 
America, and we were stopping in the great 
city of Philadelphia. I marvelled at that 
time at the pictured suffering wrought on 
Christians, and I noticed in the audience 
there were many handsome, saintly-faced 
clergymen. I have thought about all this 
here in Belgium as I look on our wronged 
people. Often I have wished I could see again 

86 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



that play, for it may be I would find comfort 
in it and be able to once again look into the 
faces of those good men. I find myself trying 
to think of those men's faces, but now, dis- 
tance and time have placed me so far away, 
so far indeed that I do not seem to be able to 
read. Our Belgium is in tears and the hearts 
of our people are mourning. The whole coun- 
try seems to be buried in a grave of suffering 
as wrongs undreamed of pass on and we stand 
afar and hope. Belgium. 



OUK MEN 

You hadn't heralds with beating drums 

Nor coats of flaming red — 

There was no time to pose for them, boys — 

Onward! was what you said. 

Your dead are mute, for their work is done, 

They have given the battle to you, 

So shoulder your gun and steady your eye, 

March on ! It is time to do. 

To do for your country, for loved ones all, 
To do for the coming years 
When the seal of Time, on things as they are, 
Tell not of a soldier's fears. 

87 



HEART MESSAGES 



Not a soldier's name will be found on that list, 
For not one man is afraid 
To meet the bold cannon, to scoff at the gun, 
For he knows them, at worst, as man-made. 

What man is afraid of man-made gun, 

What man is afraid of a foe? 

Old Time will tell you some day himself, 

Our men were too ready to go. 

The bold battle-guns on the brave battle-line 

May mock men from every side, 

And the gray of the smoke, if it mantles the 

dead, 
Not a man used that mantle to hide. 

So march to the glory, of flute-notes or drum, 
Or with only the flag that you love, 
You are on the tramp for those at home, 
And for Eight, that was coined above. 
Does any man grudge, to Trial's way, 
The toll of a few small years, 
So that Love may bend, or his form at rest, 
To smile through her holy tears? 

No ! Away to the battle, since go you must 
And steady ! each man with a will, 
Go into the thick of the reeking Hell, 
Till the fires are embered and still. 

88 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



'Tis Humanity's voice, that is calling to you, 
Your ears have drunk from the sound, 
Be off to the front ! There is work to do. 
Wrong must be brought to the ground. 



The Way of the Cross 

Dear Friend: What we want is our coun- 
try; we want it back again. We will not be 
as we were, not for a long time, if we ever do 
get our country back, but we will work hard, 
and from hard work we might make it some- 
thing like it once was. 

Our children ask us why all this is, and we 
wonder why ourselves, for we do not know 
where the answer is hiding. 

Our King Albert has been so wonderful, has 
made himself almost a plain Belgian, and poor 
people so distressed as to be nearly crazed, 
have often seen tears in his eyes from the 
sorrows that are in his heart. Why, we could 
see he was trying to make us forget he was a 
King, and he came to us suffering himself, and 
was so kind and gentle we just took courage, 

89 



HEART MESSAGES 



for we saw lie was trying hard to make us 
brave. 

Our children weep and we cannot please 
them. We try to please them but we cannot, 
since it is only words we have to give them. 
Meat, counted in American money, is now 
one dollar and twenty-five cents a pound. And 
our Government cannot even contract a loan 
because Germany 1 refused to permit it while 
our country is held in German hands. We 
were so happy once. Now, families are separ- 
ated, and some are lost forever, for we know 
nothing of their whereabouts. Those we know 
to be dead, we know where they are, but 
many children and young people are missing, 
and many tired eyes have become almost 
blinded watching for them everywhere. One 
gives up looking after many weeks of patient 
watching and praying. 

Sometimes, when people in country places, 
or even in a big city like Brussels, suddenly 
see a shadow before them at night time or in 
the day, they have been known to cry out, 
thinking it is some one who has been lost and 
is returning home. Yet the Belgians try to 

90 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



keep on hoping. People with kind hearts in 
their bodies heard the broken-hearted moans 
of our people, and many things of comfort 
were sent to them, — clothes to cover their 
nakedness and food for starving bodies. 

I am a young soldier and have much to 
learn, but I never want to learn more about 
misery than I have seen in trampled, tortured, 
ill-used Belgium. 

As long as I live I shall never forget one 
old man I found on the streets on the day 
when the German soldiers had entered Bel- 
gium. 

He was a man about eighty-five years old, 
with a long white beard and soft white hair. 
I had seen him often before and always when 
I saw him he was moving feebly along, lean- 
ing heavily on a cane. 

But the day of which I write, I saw that old 
man hurrying along the streets without his 
cane. Every few minutes he would look back, 
then he would turn and hurry on again. I 
stopped him, as I thought maybe his reason 
had left him. 

"Tell me," I said, "where are you going?" 

91 



? 



HEART MESSAGES 



"Where am I going, boy," lie said, as he 
halted and looked sadly into my face. "I'm 
going the way of the Cross. Look, young 
man!" He turned and pointed first to the 
North, then to the South, to the East, and to 
the West. "That forms a cross," he said, "and 
this day is the day of our crucifixion." 

"Come with me," I said, "I will take \ou to 
safety." 

"I am going into the church, boy," he re- 
plied. "I was there at baptism and I want to 
be there at death." 

He hurried away almost like a man in the 
prime of his life, but I learned later that when 
he reached the church he found the doors had 
been locked by the German soldiers. He was 
found dead in the cemetery near the graves 
of his wife and his children. 

It is said in Belgium now, that when the 
Germans are pushed from the Somme front 
they will come to the Belgian frontier, but for 
happenings we can only wait. 

Generations yet unborn will never under- 
stand the filth of the the path we are travelling 
now. If their feet go by our graves in hap- 

92 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



piness, let us hope they will feel a thrill for 
what we have suffered as we went on before 
them. Thank God no man can pass the same 
way through the world a second time ! 

Belgium, 



If there were no Women 

Some of the fellows here would really like 
to solve your puzzle. But a question answered 
in a haphazard way takes with it no guarantee 
that the puzzle has been satisfactorily solved. 
Words may explain much, but to really under- 
stand, one must be, or must have been, a part 
of the thing he is trying to explain. It is true 
I am one, but only one, out of millions of men 
in this big storm of Kage, and it may be, if 
you appreciate words, you can gather some 
idea of the storm as it is. 

You have asked a lot of the fellows to tell 
you of things they see. Well, many a time 
they cannot see at all. They often grope on, 
through the darkness of smoke that chokes 
them almost into suffocation, and often, when 
blinded and choking, a period stops them 

93 



HEAR* MESSAGES 

short. It comes in the form of a bullet, and 
when it arrives, they know, if they know any- 
thing at all, that their groping is at an end. 

Of all the stubborn things, the most 
stubborn is Death. When it comes, no per- 
suasion on earth can move a man to the firing 
line again. Then, brave, handsome men, often 
stand knee deep in mud while their eyes look 
off toward the cannon's smoke, where, as they 
look, sometimes, foolish fellows, — they build. 
Let what they build be tall or little, you may 
be sure the castle is a fairy one for them, for 
anyone can see by their expression that the 
castle they are building is meant for a woman. 

When the smoke is down and when the frail 
castle for a time has been demolished, I wish 
you would see the men leaning on their elbows 
as they look off in the distance, writing their 
love stories in the cornerstones of their minds. 
Maybe she is his mother, or his sweetheart. 
Maybe she is his daughter or his wife. One 
thing you may be sure of: when an attack is 
not on or one is not hourly looking for an at- 
tack, each man is dreaming of some woman. 
It is a woman who always walks into the 

94 



EROM THE TRENCHES 



heads of the fellows here and invites the poor 
devils to make of her a dream. 

Men brought together as they never have 
been before in the world's history, soon learn 
the map of the other fellow's mind, and I can 
assure you it is the dream woman that quick- 
ens a man's resolve. 

If there were no women to return to after 
a long-drawn-out battle-day, if there were no 
homes, no children — well, chills would soon 
replace chivalry, and men would look at each 
other, a hatred yet unborn would enter their 
hearts and it wouldn't take long for them to 
sink into the inaction that would carry them 
back to the day that would give them a chance 
to prove the Darwinian theory. 

When I was a boy, I attended a country 
school. There, I used to sit on a bench under 
a big tree that held out great strong arms call- 
ing for the wind to come and rock her. I have 
often wondered if that big tree knew the 
thoughts of the boy who was under one of her 
long dark arms. If she did, she would know 
I was thinking of the things I had read about 
wars in the school history. Many a time as 

95 



HEART MESSAGES 



I sat dreaming, other fellows would steal up 
behind me and too often the bench I was 
sitting on rudely invited me to the ground. 

I was always up and at them, and many a 
time boys were bumped by my fist as hard as 
the ground bumped me when I was sent to it. 
Bumps, however, could never erase from my 
mind the romantic dreams I had in my school 
days concerning war times. Now that I am 
in the worst war the world has ever known, I 
know my school-day dreams were bubbles be- 
side this big fight. 

Only yesterday I saw a man take the entire 
scalp off a man's head. Then, throwing it to 
another man, he called out to him to make of 
it a muff to guard against the cold weather 
that was coming on. This kind of thing goes 
on almost daily, and you ask me to describe it. 
I cannot describe it just as it is,, but it is 
something like this. 

Have you ever seen a great crowd of men 
that suddenly seemed to have gone stark mad? 
Have you ever heard the cry of anguished 
surprise, or the terrible noise of mocking artil- 
lery? Have you heard the booming of can- 

96 



FROM THE TRANCHES 



nons? Have you seen the smoke, light and 
airy as it went upwards, or heavy, threatening 
and foreboding as it slowly lifts to show you 
the horrors beneath it? Have you ever seen 
men! trampling one another? All the while 
you are forced to press on, knowing that the 
dying men beneath your feet are the worse 
for the weight of your heavy body, while the 
rivers of blood could find no outlet on the 
ground and must take their own time to sink 
in, and away from your horrified view. 

Have you ever seen wounded men, carried 
in the open way of danger by comrades brave 
enough to risk their own lives, so that a friend 
may be made more comfortable? Have you 
ever seen the sweat on the forehead turn 
grimy and thick and the eyebrows become 
loaded with the weight of the dust that 
gathers until it enters the eyes? 

Have) you ever seen men break their own 
teeth as their jaws clinch with suffering, even 
as they refuse to call out, fearing to give satis- 
faction to the ears of a possible enemy? Above 
all this, have you ever seen the big dark devil- 
bird high in the air covering the horrors below 

97 



HEART MESSAGES 



as it glides along diligently looking for 
lives, perhaps of a few delicate women or 
children? 

One day last week I found two children lost 
and standing motionless on the field. Both 
were crying, as they clung one to the other, 
bound together by a common .error. They 
had forgotten their names, forgotten all else 
but their fright, that seemed to have paralyzed 
them completely. I took them up on my horse 
and carried them into the nearest village, 
where a woman, too poor to care for herself, 
volunteered to take care of the children. This 
is something like war. Have you peeped into 
the hospitals? Have you seen what is left of 
what was magnificent manhood? Have you 
heard him say with the little strength that is 
left in his weakened body that he wanted to 
be patched up so that he might once again be 
on the firing line? 

I have laid awake at night because my 
brain was rocked by the noise of the cannon, 
and rest was hammered into what seemed to 
me to be one eternal waking journey. 

Men crouch around me, and just across the 

98 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



firing line other men are crouching, each and 
all planning to do the other fellow up, while 
overhead, the stars wink and around me the 
winds moan. 

"God!" a man said yesterday, "I can't get 
it out of my head how I felt when I was in 
the German trench and helped to take German 
prisoners. To my left I suddenly saw a fellow 
who had been my lifelong friend. Before me 
was a comrade about to do him up. I shud- 
dered as I turned my head away, but as I did 
so, I heard his voice as he called to me. 'It's 
all right, Larrie, I'd have done as much for 
you.' " 

From my thoughts one thought is upper- 
most. Can it be true that everything goes 
only to a certain height and then for some 
reason begins the downward course? The 
rose bush, the tree, the height of man, the 
grass grown too tall, droops back again to 
the earth. 

From old ways, new ways will be born, and 
as* sparks from the anvil fade in the distance, 
so will grass grow and flowers bloom over the 
soldiers' graves. I am expecting to go into 



HEART MESSAGES 



battle perhaps in less than forty-eight hours. 
It may be that I am one who has grown too 
tall and may need pruning. From dreams in 
a country school-yard, where wars were al- 
ways so wonderfully romantic, I have left 
behind me forever the coarse-limbed tree, and 
I am here in a filthy, muddy trench, the living 
opposite of childhood's empty dream. I am 
going out, and I am going out unafraid. If 
I must be knocked down for the things men 
hope to build up, it may be that my mission 
on earth has been a privilege, and I say to 
you and to the great people of your wonderful 
country, that I wish you well and I hope you 
may never know the horrors men here have 
experienced in a conflict that after all seems 
such a terrible penalty for humanity to pay 
for the privilege of paving better ways. 

Somewhere in Flanders. 



The Old Man 

I cannot thank you enough for your kind- 
ness to our boys over here in France. Your 
letters have been wonderfully helpful, and I 

100 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



want you to know your messages of cheer and 
good will came to the boys like rays of sun- 
shine on such cloudy days. 

It is good to know the best people in your 
country are with us in this war. Will you 
think I am complaining if I venture to say, 
however, that while sympathy and prayers are 
fine in their way, — active help would be far 
more practical. 

Well, why write of that to you, who have 
given the best that was in your mind just to 
encourage us? Later on, you shall see we 
mean to keep a promise now made to you. We 
are going to win. No matter how big a fight 
the Huns may put up, we will win out on the 
closing day. 

When the war started they were the only 
people who were ready, — I was going to say, 
good and ready. On second thought I shall 
simply say, they were the only people who 
were ready. They had the largest and most 
perfect fighting machine the world has ever 
seen. We had practically no army worth 
speaking about — few guns, and only a very 
limited amount of ammunition, 

JOT 



HEART MESSAGES 



Between the French and ourselves, we 
managed to stand them off in spite of all their 
advantages over us, and we feel that if they 
couldn't win during the first three months, 
when they had every advantage in their favor, 
it is an impossibility for them to win now that 
we are fully organized and are superior in 
men and in guns. 

In morale, too, we are far superior. Our 
men know that we can beat the enemy every 
time we meet and almost under any condition 
now. The Huns have not the same stomach 
for a good standup fight that they had two 
years ago, and I think our boys have taken 
much of the overflow of conceit out of them. 

Perhaps you would like to know about some 
of the things that go on at the front. If this 
letter is allowed to pass to you by the Censor, 
this incident in which I participated not long 
ago will very likely interest you. 

You know we are not allowed to send any 
information in our letters that might be of 
value to the enemy if published, and this being 
so, I cannot be more specific as to names, 
places and dates. 

102 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



I may say, however, that our battalion is a 
Canadian one, and has been somewhere in 
France for the past twelve months. Of course, 
we have had our share of fighting. Our losses 
have been very heavy, and many fine brave 
young fellows we have laid away since we 
came over here. Many of our men, too, have 
been wounded, some of them have been so 
badly wounded that they can never go back 
on duty again. Our commanding officer, 
although Canadian born and bred, was a re- 
tired Imperial army officer. When the war 
broke out they couldn't hold him back and he 
was given command of one of the battalions 
that were being raised in Ontario. 

The commanding officer of the battalion is 
generally known as "The Colonel," or the C. 
C, for short, like Lord Roberts was familiarly 
known as "Bobs" because he was the idol of 
the British army. So our Colonel was known 
to us all as the "Old Man," not because he 
was old, for he was not much over fifty, but 
because we all really loved him. 

Our Colonel was a gentleman in the truest 
sense of the word, and with us, his word was 

103 



HEART MESSAGES 



law, and his decisions were accepted always 
without a murmur. Was he brave? Ah ! I speak 
for all the boys and tell you something. On 
his breast were the ribbons for three cam- 
paigns and two special decorations for merit, 
and his war record was one that any soldier 
might well be proud of. With all this he 
wasn't a martinet. The comfort of his men 
was always his first thought, and he set his 
officers an example in this respect that they 
were all willing, and even proud, to follow. 

When he was on the march our "Old Man" 
was very seldom mounted. He generally 
trudged along with his battalion, and as for 
grub, — what was good enough for his men 
was quite good enough for him. 

In appearance he was rather small, and even 
meek looking. But when it came to fighting, 
— well, say — he was something to wonder at. 
He was a perfect demon. When not in action 
the demon was nowhere to be seen, and some- 
thing of the angel seemed to be looking out 
through his nature. 

It was always, "Come on, boys," and every 
man-Jack-of-us would have followed him to 

104 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



certain death rather than lag behind when he 
was before ns leading the way. 

With such a commanding officer, it was no 
wonder that our battalion gained a good repu- 
tation for doing things, or that we were 
selected to attack one of the strongest posi- 
tions in the German lines. The enemy had 
boasted that the position was impregnable. 
They often jeered our men across "No-Man's- 
land," that lay between our trench and theirs, 
for they were very close together at this point, 
and they often dared us to "Come on." This 
had worked us all up into a very angry state, 
and we swore that when we got the order to 
attack, we would make a thorough job of it, 
no matter how good a fight the Huns put up. 

When finally we got the order to charge, we 
went in with a will, and were on top of those 
Huns, I think, before they quite realized that 
an attack was coming. As usual, our Colonel 
showed us the way, and we followed him, 
knowing that he was leading us to victory. 
In five minutes there wasn't much fight left in 
any Huns that were alive in those trenches. 
We had cleaned them out so thoroughly that 

105 



HEART MESSAGES 



there was no doubt who had won the fight. 
There were a couple of counter-attacks before 
we had time to consolidate our winnings, but 
so good was the practice of our artillery that 
but few Germans succeeded in reaching us, 
and these were either shot down or taken 
prisoners. 

By this time it was dark night. A heavy 
downpour of rain was falling, and after con- 
solidating our gains as best we could, we set 
about removing the dead and getting the 
wounded back where they could receive medi- 
cal attention. I had been shot through the 
left arm, but a brother officer had given me 
first aid, and although I was very weak, I 
managed to find my way back to the dressing- 
station in the rear. As I passed along, oc- 
casionally meeting comrades, inquiries were 
plentiful as to how we had fared, who had 
been killed, who were wounded, how badly, 
and where were they lying. 

One question was invariably asked. "How is 
the 'Old Man?' Is the 'Old Man' all right ?" 

So far as I knew, he was all right. When 
I had last seen him, he was in the enemy 

106 



FROM THE TRANCHES 



trench, and had shot down a German officer, 
and was emptying his automatic into some 
dozen of the enemy who were putting up a 
stiff fight. Our arrival, and the landing of a 
couple of bombsf in their midst, made them 
quickly throw up their hands and surrender, 
and soon some new development in the fight 
separated us and I had all I could do to look 
after myself. It was while consolidating the 
trenches that I got the bullet through my arm. 

When near our quarters, who should I run 
up against but McGuire, the Colonel's body 
servant, an old Irish veteran, who had been 
the Colonel's man when he was in the regular 
army. They had served together, those two, 
for over twenty years, and the love that David 
felt for Jonothan wasn't in it with the way 
McGuire idolized the "Old Man." 

McGuire thought the sun rose in the 
Colonel's eyes, and set especially for the bene- 
fit of his master's rest, and woe betide any 
one in the battalion or outside of it, who dares 
to say a word against the Colonel of our 
battalion in the presence of McGuire. 

He tackled me at once with "Have you 

107 



HEART MESSAGES 



seen the 'Auld Man' tell me, have you seen 
him, and how is he?" I hastened to assure 
him that the "Colonel" was all right when I 
last saw him, and that I had been talking to 
him but a few minutes before. As McGuire 
and I were talking there came to us the steady 
noise of tramping feet, and presently one of 
our sergeants, with his head bound up, and 
looking very pale, his clothes covered with 
mud, came into the streak of light that shone 
from the door of the little shack where 
McGuire held undisputed authority. At once 
he was greeted by McGuire's anxious inquiry, 
"Hullo, I am glad to see you alive. Is the 
'Auld Man' come?" The sergeant halted sud- 
denly, and stood at the salute and then look- 
ing at McGuire and myself in a dazed sort of 
way, he stammered, "Yes — the 'Auld Man' has 
come. The — 'Old Man' — has come — back." 

McGuire's face was aglow at the good news, 
and he hurried away to the regimental cook 
sergeant for the hot tea he knew his master 
would be needing after his long day of trial. 
He meant the "Old Man" should take his rest 
after he had been warmed up, and he went off 

108 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



murmuring that be would see to it that no one 
should disturb his rest. 

Soon he was hurrying back with a steaming 
cup in his hand, but just before he reached the 
shelter he had put up for his master, he was 
stopped by one of the regimental officers. 
Saluting, McGuire said, "Very glad to see 
you safe, Captain, I suppose you know the 
'Auld Man' is come." 

With a haggard face and twitching lips, the 
officer replied in a low tone, "Oh, yes, the 
Colonel is here." McGuire pushed his way 
into the rude hut where he found the regi- 
mental doctor and several other officers stand- 
ing between the door and his master's couch. 
Forgetting military etiquette for once, he 
eagerly called across them to his master: 
"Colonel, indade I'm glad you're back, sir! 
I have your tea here, sir — or perhaps you 
would like a little hot soup, sir, — or else 
maybe " 

One of the officers interrupted him. Laying 
his hand upon his shoulder, he said in a hoarse 
whisper, "Don't you understand, McGuire — 

the Colonel is- " 

109 



HEART MESSAGES 



The two men looked into each other's eyes 
for a moment and then McGuire, with a groan 
that seemed to rend the very heart within him, 
staggered forward. The officers stood aside 
so that he might see the outline of a figure 
which was lying on the couch covered by a 
military cloak. McGuire was on his knees, 
and with a touch as gentle as a woman's, he 
reverently raised the covering and gazed upon 
the cold dead face of the master he had loved 
so well, and served for so many eventful years. 
At the sight of McGuire's grief, the officers 
turned away, so that they might not appear to 
witness a man's heartbroken agony. 

On the face of the "Old Man" there was a 
smile like the smile he was always so ready to 
give when any one was downhearted and 
needed a little bracing up. Looking at him, I 
felt that the soul of the man had found its way 
out through that kindly smile, for to me, his 
smile had always explained the workings that 
were hidden away in a heart both generous 
and humane. His spirit had passed in the 
hour of victory, but he left behind him, to his 
battalion, a record that would always be kept 

110 



EHOM THE TRENCHES 



sacred in memory to inspire those who re- 
mained to emulate his courage. 

Somewhere in France. 



Actors Always Prepare 

Germans are a glad lot when they are taken 
as prisoners and safely housed and fed by the 
English hand. Nearly all the prisoners ex- 
press themselves as relieved at being out of 
the conflict. It is amazing to see what a happy 
lot they are, herded together in an English 
prison, for without exception all of them 
seemed certain of being exterminated by the 
guns of the Allies. Moreover, few of the Ger- 
man prisoners-of-war seem to understand the 
nature of the conflict, but all of them have 
deeply imbedded in their mind the super- 
stitious certainty that a Divine Providence 
will give to the Fatherland a victory that will 
mock enemies for all time to come. 

Nearly all of them have ping-pong heads, 
are narrow-chested, weak of limb and, taking 
them altogether, they are a sorry-looking lot. 
Their belief in the Kaiser is pathetic. To him 

111 



HEART MESSAGES 



the right to hew down or to build up at will. 
They pray but little, feeling assured their 
cause is well-protected, so they eat, and sing 
the songs dear to the German heart, and if in 
their sleep they have dreams, they are sure to 
be of the spilling of English blood and their 
successful entry into London. 

Since coming here I know well England 
never expected Germany to attack her. Eng- 
land admired Germany in many ways and 
considered her a friend. Germany is con- 
sidered an educated nation, but her education 
is narrow, being of the brain and not of the 
heart. She was a nation getting ready for the 
wider opening of her mouth, having long had 
a taste for greater power. If she were to win 
in this conflict she would open her mouth all 
the wider, in the hope of swallowing other 
nations. England wanted peace and therefore 
was slow preparing to meet an enemy. Ger- 
many was long preparing and she was uppish 
accordingly. 

Actors always prepare before coming into 
the glare of the foot-lights. Once there, they 
feel assured of their power, and it takes more 

s 112 



FROM THE TRENCHES 

than incandescent lights to knock them from 
their self poise. 

The Kaiser has been a good warrior, but he 
will be sure to die a good worrier ! 

Somewhere in France. 



A Woman Looked Up at Me from the Street 
I am resting in* a hospital here trying to 
get well of my wounds. Men around me are 
trying hard to fool themselves into the thought 
that they are happy. Often when a poor devil 
groans in agony we try to think it is the sound 
of an organ playing his wedding march. It is 
sunny in the streets outside, but in here we 
see it as though we were looking through a 
veil, or as if something is held over our eyes. 
I wish we could get healed as quickly as we 
got wounded. Good things always come 
slower than bad things, but a good thing came 
quickly to me only a few minutes ago. 

A woman looked up at me from the street 
and waved her handkerchief and smiled. I 
didn't happen to have a handkerchief ready, 
but the bandage on my arm was loose, so I 

113 



HEART MESSAGES 



pulled it off and waved back at her. Then we 
both laughed, and now I feel more cheerful 
and somehow everything seems to have bright- 
ened up a bit. 

Can't you do something to help us realize 
our wishes? We are always wishing. We keep 
on wishing and through it all we do not seem 
to be able to forget. 

Men are coming in here daily and sometimes 
they come in nearly every hour. Last night 
a thunder- storm came up and all the men 
woke up — some of them calling out loud. They 
thought they were in the thick of it again — 
but very few of them ever will be, for most of 
them are done for. 

I am now going to look, hoping to again see 
the pretty woman pass in the street beneath 
my window. I have my bandage ready and 
shall wave first, if I am lucky enough to see 
her coming. What would sick and wounded 
men do if they could never see a woman's 
face? 

Paris. 



114 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



Meeting the Kids at Home 

Lately there has been a sad falling off of 
our brave soldiers. If we live to get back 
home one thought makes us grow cold; that 
thought is our march through the city streets 
while some of our bravest boys are lying dead 
away off here and we are going back home 
without them. Now we understand the wet 
eyes of those who loved us best when we left 
home. After all, it seems to be the women 
who understand suffering. Men must ex- 
perience it, or see it, to properly understand. 

How can we meet the gaze of the mothers of 
our dead comrades? How can we meet the 
look in the eyes of sweethearts and of wives? 
Above all, how can we look into the eyes of 
inquiring little children, and how can we 
properly explain to them? 

One of my comrades received a letter the 
other day from his little girl. She wrote him 
"To hurry home so he can rock her to sleep in 
his arms as he did before he went away." 

The child is an invalid, and when the letter 
was read to my comrade he wept bitter tears 
from feis sightless eyes. He is stone blind and 

115 



HEART MESSAGES 



both his arms are gone. He wants to die, but 
the soul is in him and he must stay a while 
longer. 

Some of our grandest soldiers are torn 
crosswise — up and down — and most of the 
wounds will never heal. 

I saw a fellow yesterday bend forward to 
drink from a cup. Suddenly, he realized both 
arms were gone. Tears fell on his cheeks and 
dried there. 

It is awful to hear the wounded soldiers 
talk about their terror of meeting the kids at 
home. Most of them are afraid the change in 
their appearance will frighten their little 
ones, and I guess it will. 

All the poor, brave, broken soldiers have to 
depend on now is— love. 

The love of their country — the love of their 
children — the love of their wives, and the 
mother-love that is immortal. 

I tell you if a good soldier's wife, or his 
children, turn from him, the broken shoulders 
that held on so bravely to his country's flag 
will degenerate from despair, and those who 
will be responsible should be branded as the 

116 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



cowards of their country for all the rest of 
their vile lives. 

Mexico has long been picking the patience 
off of the gilding of the American gate. We 
trust Mexico is not big enough to carry your 
great nation into a war, for does it not seem 
pitiful to chastise the people of such a race by 
steeping the rod in the blood of good men? 

Many of the fellows here wish your country 
was fighting with the Allies, — your English- 
speaking cousins. No doubt you are doing 
much good for us in your own way, and we 
hope you understand that we feel we are 
capable of bringing the German Kaiser to the 
use of New Thought, — as a looking-glass 
through which he can view himself and his 
methods for all future time. 

Certainly his barbarous system has fur- 
rowed the brow of the whole civilized world 
into a lasting frown. 

One may travel far on the avenues of Wrong 
— but the price of leather is sometimes very 
high, and when one's shoes are at last worn to 
the skin the road of Wrong is not so pleasant, 



117 



HEART MESSAGES 



as anyone who has travelled that road knows 
to his sorrow. 

I cannot write poetry — much as I should 
like to answer you in' that way. Here is a 
verse that suggests itself to me at the present 
time. I have called it: 

DOWN WITH THE KAISER'S WISH. 

Down with the Kaiser and his men, 
Down with his brutal, babbling ken, 
Down with all those who wish him well, 
Down with his Wish — to his Friend in Hell. 

Somewhere in Flanders. 

VERDUN 

Verdun, we sing your song of praise today, 
'Twas you, who battled, you who to Paris 

blocked the way, 
Thy gates immortal stand, upon a height 
Locked by the guards of Valor and of Right. 

Verdun, eternal Verdun, while years are in 

the world, 
Thy heroism, for all time, shall be unfurled. 
Thy strength, a monument, enduring, just, 
Shall point to Triumph, while tfeiue enemies, 

are— Dust. 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



The Mothers and the Wives 

Have been at Verdun but I am now going 
toward the north of France. You should see 
Paris as I see it today. Never was it as pic- 
turesque as it is at the present time with its 
uniformed soldiers; its proud young braves 
wearing their decorations, won on the battle- 
field. 

The anxious look on the faces of the French 
people is giving way to a more peaceful look 
of resignation. Whenever there comes the 
sound of the Marseillaise, people everywhere 
seem suddenly to grow frantic. I recall the 
week in the early days of the war when the 
American Ambassador made a formal declara- 
tion requesting Americans to leave Paris. 
That week over a million people hurriedly left 
the city and everywhere horror brooded over a 
great people. Many French families left also, 
fearing for the lives of their little children, 
but my family decided to remain by the guns 
to the very last. 

A, few weeks ago I received a letter from my 
mother. The envelope was bordered in black 
and before opening it it told me t&e $tory I 

119 



HEART MESSAGES 



was expecting to hear. I read on that black 
border of the death of my brave soldier 
brother. He had been terribly wounded at 
Verdun and he died a horrible death, caused 
by coming into contact with German gases. 
His lungs were eaten away and his eyes de- 
stroyed. I am glad he is gone. I tell you it 
is better so. When a fine fellow is torn to 
pieces with his future before him and he only 
a remnant of what he was, one likes to think 
of such a one as sleeping. My mother in time 
will be resigned when she realizes she has 
given a son for a cause that will bring lasting 
peace to an otherwise threatened world. She 
says she is grieving now for other mothers — 
those who know their sons are suffering and 
they can be of little use to them. 

I tell you it is the mothers and the wives 
who have felt the sting of suffering the most, 
and I am afraid men will always see in the 
eyes of our women at home the hidden suffer- 
ing they are so bravely trying to carry in their 
almost broken hearts. 

France. 



120 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



You Ask Such Questions 

All around me there are big brave fellows 
with big brave hearts, and into their big brave 
hearts comes a feeling of thankfulness that 
they are not forgotten. That thought 
strengthens the soldiers and when, once in a 
while, a fellow begins to hang his under jaw, 
all the others try to boost him up by telling 
him he is a silly ass for his dejection, for he 
is not forgotten. 

You ask such questions. Why, don't you 
know the questions you ask are the last letters 
of the alphabet. We are not down that far in 
letters as yet, so we can't spell out the things 
we do not know. But as to how a man feels — 
or as to how men feel when going right into a 
battle — well, that is so big a question that to 
describe it makes a fellow feel just about as 
drunk as he felt when he was right in the 
battle smoke, when all around him and before 
him, and above him, he seemed forever to have 
closed himself away from all hope. 

That he could ever again find his way back 
from the dense forest of smoke, — that he could 
ever again expect to go back to his old life 

121 



HEART MESSAGES 



seems, if he thinks of it at all, — only a foolish 
dream which quickly passes as the smoke re- 
mains. 

I was right in the thick of that smoke, — 
right in the midst of it. When we should have 
been saying "May God forgive us," — we went, 
man for man, with bayonet and with fist, each 
determined to put the other down. We took 
the trench we wanted. We lost it again and 
once again we took it. The price was great. 
Long afterwards we knew the price had to be 
paid for the men who went down in the smoke, 
not only by the men themselves, but by the 
wives and the parents and the children that 
must get a dose of the bitter afterwards. 

So I must tell you that a man really don't 
know just how he feels when he is in a hand- 
to-hand battle, or in the thick of the smoke 
that spells death. Nor does a man know how 
strong he really is until he knows his time has 
come, either to grip on or to hand over his last 
breath. 

It might surprise you to hear that a lot of 
the men are superstitious when face to face 
with clanger* Beeing as much q4 tl^em as % 

122 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



have, I think if the poor fellows take comfort 
in superstition it does a great deal of good. 

I saw one fellow hold tenderly to a rabbit's 
foot which his wife had given him when he 
was leaving home. It surprised me to see the 
comfort that man got from the ugly thing 
which is supposed to; bring its owner luck. 
When we went into action he was right by my 
side, and I saw him go down, never to breathe 



again. 



A few days before he was killed, he had said 
to me, "You've been mighty good to me, Joe. 
Let me tell you something: If at any time I 
should forget to take my rabbit's foot with 
me, should we get a call, and if anything 
should happen that I don't get back, you just 
take it, for if I can see and know anything, it 
will make me feel glad to know you are having 
luck." 

The chaplain made such a beautiful prayer 
when he was buried, but I think I was the only 
one who knew that in his pocket was stored 
away the rabbit's foot, which had failed him 
at the end. 

France. 
123 



HEART MESSAGES 

War Machinery Turns the Knitting Needle 

As I look over the ruins, I try to think. But 
thinking* is like a crochet needle that twines 
itself into the thread so that the pattern may 
be woven and at the end will come that which 
was desired. 

I am a soldier, and not knowing how to use 
the needle, can only look over the ruins here 
and try to think what the city of Verdun was 
like before the scourge of war. The things 
that are to be in the future, when the noise 
of battle has ceased and when the ruins are 
repolished and the quiet has been restored, 
one can only surmise. 

The terrible drive of the German soldiers 
and their frantic efforts to gain the road to 
Paris has been so awful that one thinks with 
dread of the mighty strength that is stored 
away in the brains and the arms of determined 
fighting men. 

I wish you could see war as it really is. 
Men and women who are far away from it no 
doubt speak of it with horror and soon they 
may grow tired of the war talk, since war is a 
heavy subject. But the men in the trenches 

124 



FROM THE TRENCHES 

i _________ 

and on the firing line, dare not grow tired of 
the talk or of the war, and day and night the 
cruel hand of the war machinery turns the 
needle that will some day finish a pattern that 
we all hope will last until the end of time. 
When such a brain moves in the head of such 
a man as Sir Douglas Haig and gets to work- 
ing, we all know the pattern will come out as 
was intended and to the credit of a civilized 
world. 

Some of the trenches are now only shell 
pits, and men have learned the quick move- 
ments that so often cheat the bullets which 
are chasing each other for the purpose of 
giving death. 

In the north the fighting is on and I am 
told it grows worse every day, but we have 
enough to do here, and we must keep at it, 
for Paris is near, and France believes in us. 
The heaps of dead German soldiers on the 
field are terrible. Many of our soldiers have 
fallen, and of course more will follow them, 
but the men are so filled with determination 
that they do not seem to be afraid. A man 
must be laid out for good before he shows the 

125 



HEABT MESSAGES 

t 

white feather. Even when he is down, it is 
seldom that he is thinking of himself. It is 
pitiful to hear some of the men talking of their 
homes and their home people when they know 
their time is short. I, myself, was wounded, 
but I can tell you I gave but little thought to 
my wounds when I saw the other fellows' 
bravery and great unselfishness. When torn 
almost into strips, many of them seem to be 
thinking only of friends and family and of the 
great cause for which they are suffering. 

"Tell my little sister I wish I had bought 
her that doll," a dying soldier whispered to me. 

"I'll get one for her, Alec," I told him. But 
he did not seem to be half satisfied. 

"Thanks," he whispered faintly, "but after 
all, Bob, that won't be me, will it? I didn't 
get her the doll in the shop window — but God 
bless you, Bob, if you will get one for her. 
You just tell her for me, I said good-bye, and 
for her to grow up and be a good girl just as 
our mother used to be. Tell her all this, Bob, 
and don't forget to tell her I just fell asleep, 
and say — Bob," he said as his voice grew 



126 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



fainter, "don't you dare go worrying my little 
sister about me." 

In a few minutes he was gone. I have 
written a friend about the doll in the win- 
dow, for who can tell whether Fate has de- 
creed that I, myself, will ever get back to 
Bob's old home? 

The men here try their best to be gay. They 
tell jokes; they sing hymns, and some of the 
boys compose funny stories, but through it- 
all there is hanging before us the gray curtain 
of the battle smoke. 

I know a number of fellows here who always 
loved the gay things of the world, but they 
are greatly changed now, and are often heard 
singing sacred hymns instead of the gay tunes 
of the Parisian cafes. 

One day a fellow was cleverly imitating 
church bells by a peculiar twist of his lips. 

"How did you catch on to that?" I asked 
him. 

"Easy enough," he answered. "A fellow 
gets- to thinking hard and then he does things. 
I am thinking here, sometimes, and in all this 
danger I see again the day when the London 

127 



HEART MESSAGES 



bells called me to worship, and I would not 
listen to them. I wish to God, Bob," he said, 
"I had the same chance now." 

That is how a lot of the men feel, for they 
know they are face to face with death. No 
soldier loves to kill. But a man must protect 
his own, and to kill before we are killed seems 
the only thing to do. It is a terrible thing, 
but it must be done. 

Before this war began many of us had 
friends in the enemy's ranks, but today each 
of us is seeking the other with shot and with 
shell, and only memories remain of the days 
when we were children and played together. 
But this is war. Horrible? Yes, but neces- 
sary. 

I studied to be a clergyman, but I am fight- 
ing instead. Gruesome, isn't it? Let us all 
hope the day may come when man's strength 
will not be the tool to put down oppressors. 
We have such wonderful brains in our war 
machinery; such men as Col. Winston Churc- 
hill, who gave up so much at home and came 
here and was soon made a Colonel; such men 
as the great Lloyd George, General Eobertson, 

128 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



Admiral Sir David Beatty, Admiral Jellico, 
Sir Edward Grey, and the Premier of Eng- 
land—Premier Asquith. Premier Asquith 
has sent to the front three of his handsome 
sons. Lieutenant Herbert Asquith and Lieu- 
tenant Arthur Asquith were wounded in the 
Dardanelles, and another brother, Raymond 
Asquith, is now at the front. Great Britain 
has not produced finer boys than the Asquith 
brothers. So you see with such fighting blood 
fighting for a great cause we have no fear of 
the outcome. 

But I am writing too long a letter. I must 
be up and doing. The soldiers send regards 
to well-wishers, for we know that well-wishers 
send thoughts our way which some day may 
bloom into one great everlasting reality. 

Verdun. 



Something the World is Calling for 

It seems to me after having seen and heard 
the horrors of this war, those who go from 
it, on hearing the national airs, will appre- 
ciate them as never before. Verdun, after a 

129 



HEART MESSAGES 



terrible resistance, has told the German War- 
God that his dream was but a dream and the 
waking time has come. After all, what a 
rotten thing is boastful strength! And how 
soon the boastful can change their tune into 
a moaning pipe. Has there ever been in the 
world's history greater evidence that the 
powerful in every walk of life are the thinking 
people who, as they go on their way, prefer to 
do things in a peaceful manner yet who, when 
unjustly aroused, can show the strength of 
the tiger's jaw? I have seen the Kaiser at 
least a dozen times in my life; and I have 
talked with him on two occasions. On both 
of those occasions he impressed me as a man 
who could not brook contradiction. While I 
have always heard him lauded as a man of 
great bravery, my private opinion of him was 
entirely the reverse. He seemed to me to be 
consumed with a vanity which was almost 
overbearing, and I recognized in his eyes and 
in his expression the type of man who, if once 
overruled, could be completely cowed. 

The fellows here feel that the Kaiser's 
dream has been to whip us good and then wink 

130 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



at America. A cousin of mine has in his pos- 
session a letter from a member of the Kaiser's 
own household, and in that letter there are 
two lines which tell how the Kaiser has always 
dreamed of becoming a greater Napoleon. 
Further on in the letter there is another 
allusion to the same subject, saying the Kaiser 
must succeed. 

Yesterday was a bleak day here. A great 
number of our brave soldiers were laid to rest, 
and I feel that every man who witnessed the 
scene was thinking of the families of the 
soldiers, probably at that moment waiting for 
news. Your country is on the peaceful side 
of the world, and if anything the fellows have 
written is worth while, you may use it to help 
humanity. 

It isn't saying much to say we are now more 
comfortable than we were at first, for at first 
our fate was hardly like anything decent men 
should have to endure. But we are in it— in it 
to bring out something that the world is call- 
ing for. In the trenches, we hear the cry, when 
we are on the fighting line, we hear the cry,— 
when we are retreating, we hear the cry. 

131 



HEART MESSAGES 



Awake and asleep we hear it, and amid in- 
sects — for there are millions of them here, 
and the filth, and the discomforts, the hunger 
and the thirst, and the suffering — no matter 
what comes, no matter what goes, the cry goes 
on and the echoes come back again to us. That 
cry is the call for victory, and the echoes are 
answered to every calling voice. We mean to 
gain victory, for it is needed for a world's 
salvation. Victory will mean future peace, 
and from peace a better humanity will surely 
arise. 

France. 



The Lord Gives and Then He Takes Things 
Back Again. 

I was at a funeral before I came into this 
war. The minister said : "The Lord gives and 
then He takes things back again." 

I have many a night thought about those 
words here in the dark. And do you know, it 
sounds all right, because I think He takes 
things back to see if we measured up as he 

132 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



wanted us to do. There is a jolly lot of beg- 
gars who would like to keep everything for 
themselves, never wanting to pass anything 
on, so that the man who gave 'em the presents 
decided it would be a lot better to have a hand 
in the gain, by taking things back and looking 
them over. 

My little baby — nine months old — died since 
I came here and I have never seen him. He 
was a little boy and I am promised his picture 
and I can hardly wait to get it, because chil- 
dren are beautiful and I wanted mine. 

I was wounded in the leg but I am better 
and am at it again for good or bad. Lord, but 
it has been awful at times! I would like to 
tell you all about it, but I am told it isn't safe. 
All the letters are to be looked at by some- 
body called a Censor. 

I wish I hadn't lost my baby, but when I 
did I sent to my wife four lines out of your 
poem to have put on the paper or at the grave- 
yard. Two fellows here helped me to pick out 
the verse and I will always remember them 
for it to my dying day. This is what I picked 
out: 

133 



HEART MESSAGES 



"Thou art as foam on galleries of a sea 
That disappears, only to rise again, 
Or valued gem, reposing in the dust, 
To resurrected be, illumined new, to reign." 

It sounds fine but it makes me feel badly. 
I must not get wounded again if I can help it, 
for I am wanted back home since the baby 
died. But here work must be done, and do you 
know what we all are? We are all capenters, 
making the pole on our flag longer so that our 
flag will go higher than it has ever been 
before. Flanders. 



Let Me Tell You Something. 

When first the boys came to war, the song 
was "Tipperary." Tipperary was a long way 
off, so the boys said then, and to me that song 
sounds a mighty long way off today. We 
can't even hear an echo of it and I know* it 
couldn't be sung nearly so loud today, because 
so many of the boys who sang that song are 
father away, now than they ever have been, 
because they will never sing another song on 
this earth. There are greater things in the 

131 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



trenches than have ever been thought outside, 
which are used to keep men from getting the 
punches of the other fellow. 

Little rooms are fitted up for the officers, 
with all kinds of conveniences and with tele- 
phones that tell us when it is time to make 
an attack. No matter how big the feet of the 
German army, nor how long their arms, they 
can't get at those men in the little rooms be- 
neath the ground. 

Let me tell you something: An organ 
grinder with a monkey trimmed in a red 
jacket and cap would be a grand party now 
for us fellows here. But on second thought, 
the red jacket and cap would have to be dis- 
carded if we wanted to keep the poor monkey 
safe from stray bullets. Men all huddled to- 
gether see great fun in things they only 
thought good enough for the kiddies before 
this war. To me it is the oddest thing to see 
us men fighting here for big things and all the 
time growing so easy to please with the little 
things. 

One day up in the north of France a crowd 
of German soldiers marched bravely into a 

135 



HEART MESSAGES 



graveyard. They took down the tombstones 
and made themselves comfortable by using the 
stones for tables on which they ate their fill 
over the printed names of the departed. The 
next day French soldiers made a discovery. 
The German soldiers, who had dined on the 
demolished gravestones, had visited a large 
vault and played shuffle-board with the coffins, 
trying, perhaps, to find out if the bones of 
the departed were strong enough to hurl back 
at their own people. 

Not far from me a fellow is singing and he 
has a sweet voice. I cannot catch the words 
he is singing, but it sounds to me like a hymn. 
I recall years ago I heard it said that every- 
thing ascends through suffering. If you will 
come into a trench you will know it is true. 
Even to ascend to the level ground might give 
our souls a good chance to peel off our bodies, 
and I can tell you when a fellow's heart is 
heavy, it is mighty hard for his body to go on. 

We are sorry our friends and our folks at 
home can't get word in a nice way if we get 
a knock-out blow. It's terrible they can't get 
a little notice about us beforehand. Not a line 

136 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



can any of them get saying, "He's a little 
worse" or "He's a little better." 

Not a line saying, "Prepare for the worst." 

When they hear about a poor duffer it's 
usually just this : "Killed in action," and I can 
believe news sent suddenly in those words 
drives many to inaction for the rest of their 
lives. 

Well-cared-for people grumble entirely too 
much, and are too ready to bite off the good 
names of people when they should be thank- 
ful for the comfortable homes that are given 
them for good purposes. I say every house is 
comfortable that doesn't let in rain. Even 
if it is in an alley, it isn't in a trench. And 
it beats me, that people who wag their tongues 
to cut other people up, enjoy themselves when 
they use the same tongue in wagging their 
prayers. 

I wish you could come to see us but then, 
what's the good of wishing? Maybe to wish 
helps to pass the time, and I can tell you if 
some of the fellows' wishes were to come true 
you would see many an odd sight. 

Flanders. 
137 



HEART MESSAGES 



To Know Things Best Is to Find Out by 
Losing. 

A snowstorm is raging, so I have time to 
write, as I promised my dying comrade I 
would. He placed his hand on his heart, and 
said, "You go on and leave me here alone, 
this will stop ticking before morning." 

He had two Australian cousins who were 
great soldiers and one of them was killed not 
long ago, somewhere on the firing line. When 
Joe was dying he told me he could see him, 
and I hope he could, for he talked about those 
cousins a great deal when he was sick. 

I suppose men have tough hearts — unlike 
a woman's — for it was not until yester- 
day that I woke up and resolved to keep my 
promise to Joe. Then I went on an errand 
for one of the officers and, passing through a 
dark strip of woods, I suddenly came to a 
grave covered with snow. I got off my 
horse and found at the head of the grave a 
rough wooden cross on which was faintly 
scribbled in lead pencil the name "Ed :" There 
was no last name. Taking off my hat from 

138 



FROM THE TRENCHES 

my head, I felt a strange chill, as I saw be- 
neath the name the words, "Home at Last." 

I suppose the fellows who put him there 
did not know his last name, and I am sorry 
for that. We think and we talk a great deal 
about people at home who live in small streets, 
with a bath-tub upstairs; with hot and cold 
water running through pipes; with gas and 
a bed at night after a warm supper. It makes 
us sick to think of them complaining. I can 
tell you that the poorest families there are 
like millionaires compared with us, so far as 
real comforts go, and they don't seem to know 
it. I suppose to know things best is to find 
out by losing. 

As for the rich — they are doing a lot to help 
us. Rich people would be heathens to tighten 
their purses just now when this old world is 
walking backwards on the edge of its heels, 
going to the side of a big hill when it may fall 
over if people do not keep up their courage and 
our courage, too. All we want is enough rope 
to pull us back, or to loosen rope enough to 
let us string up the barbarians. Today, France 
is all snow, all dark, all gloom, and the end 

139 



HEABT MESSAGES 



is far away, but we are heading for Berlin 
and if we do get there we will not treat the 
Germans with the low brutality they handed 
out to decent people beyond their gates. 

France. 



THE CLOUDS AND THE BLUE. 

When the clouds are kissing the blue, dear, 
7 Tis then I am thinking of you, dear. 
And when the raindrops are falling too, 
Kissing the earth, I am thinking of you, 
For you are the rose of my lonely life, 
You are the song on the lips of strife. 

When the clouds are kissing the blue, dear, 
'Tis then I am thinking of you, dear. 
Over the waters and far o'er the land 
You guide my life — you gave me your hand, 
You are the joy in the heart of Love, 
You are my hope of the earth and above. 

When the raindrops are falling too, dear, 
I know you are always true, dear. 
Night is on me, and you are away, 
Away in the land of our own yesterday. 
In clouds and in raindrops, again I see, 
And I hear your voice — it is calling me. 

140 



EBOM THE TBENCHES 



I am writing to tell you that a handsome 
chap, just as brave as he was handsome, had 
the words of the Clouds and the Blue. I want 
you to know the boy loved the verses. He was 
an Australian and he was hit by a fragment 
of a shell and died soon afterwards. Before 
he went he gave me the words, but I am not 
sure about making them out properly for the 
paper is mud-stained and torn. 

I know you wish us good luck. We need it. 

Flanders. 



I Was Not Afraid to Die. 

Not a soul can get what the good people 
have sent us here, unless they get us too. 

My brother was killed in Belgium after he 
had returned from a visit to France. The 
Germans came through and just powdered 
the whole country, and my poor brother went 
down without time to say a word to his God 
about his fear or his hope of meeting Him. 

Our skins are growing thick and coarse, but 
Dur hearts are softer than when we came into 

141 



HEART MESSAGES 

this awful war. Men grow sick and reel at 
the ghastly memory of broken lives and lost 
homes. Sometimes it is a relief when we hear 
a torn comrade is dead and gone away from 
it all. Our King is more than King — our King 
is a Saint. Our Queen is our guardian angel 
and we know our God is looking on. Some 
of the German soldiers here said to us, "You 
see what your God does for you now. God is 
with the Germans, you fool, and as long as 
you have eyes, use them and see that this is 
so." 

I was not afraid to die so I answered back: 
"We trust in God, even though such as you 
bring to us black suffering. God knows what 
suffering means, and He knows that from it, 
can be built up to Him, men who stand deep 
in the ruins made by His enemies." 

The German soldiers laughed loudly at me 
and then a very stout German soldier spat in 
my face. The other soldiers looking on 
laughed again — then most of them spat on the 
ground. I wiped off the insult with my hand- 
kerchief and later I threw the handkerchief 
away. I knew it seemed wasteful to be reck- 

142 



EBOM THE TRENCHES 



less with the linen, but somehow that hand- 
kerchief seemed to me to be accursed. 

Whether or not the German Emperor con- 
siders himself a figure of destiny, he and his 
people can best answer, but those who have 
seen the brutality and have felt the iron glove 
of the German have good reason to feel that 
detestation would be the word that could bet- 
ter describe the whole German military 
system. 

We have patience and we hope on. I am 
glad to say I can write and speak English as 
well as I do my native tongue. Just now I 
recall lines from a little hymn I heard when, 
as a small boy, I was visiting in Ireland. 

"Dark Mght has come down 
On this rough-spoken world; 
But the banner of Truth, 
Is forever unfurled. 
Though night is upon us, 
No home can we see, 
Our Father in Heaven 
We call upon Thee." 

From somewhere in Belgium. 



143 



HEART MESSAGES 



Lights Went Out All Over Paris. 

Last night I saw a Zeppelin. I was ont on 
a balcony making it comfortable for some 
ladies who wanted to come out there to look 
over the city. I was at Verdun and got a good 
case of poisoning from German gas and I am 
now improving and am on a visit to friends 
in Paris. I hope to go north in the near future 
but I know you would much rather hear about 
the Zeppelin. 

The telephone in the room behind the bal- 
cony rang once, twice and thrice. I could not 
move. I just looked up and kept looking up 
on the thing coming on through the night. 
The lights went out all over Paris, but the 
telephone kept on ringing. There I was on 
the balcony, unable to move. In a little while 
I ran inside to get my pistol. I found it and 
let the telephone ring. Then I went back to 
the balcony and watched the night-bird. After 
awhile it seemed to come lower down, and 
then I must have lost my head, for I shot at 
it and soon my revolver was empty. The 
damnable bird came on, not in the least dis- 
turbed by my pistol shots, and someone 

144 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



screamed at me to get inside, but I hated to 
move. Suddenly I thought of the women folk 
inside. I ran in and down the stairs and told 
them to lie on the floor and get under blankets. 
This they did, but the noise outside that night 
would make your blood run cold. We are 
alive yet, but many are dead and the killing 
is still going on in this war which never seems 
to get tired, no matter how many men it calls 
away. 

France. 



Sometimes They Break Without Powder 
or Shell. 
I want to let you know how we are doing 
at present. So far I and my relatives are safe 
but we are busy trying to keep on the lookout 
to escape the sudden coming of German gas. 
You know if the wind is from the enemy's 
side, the gas comes through pipes and might 
get at us without notice. Some of the trenches 
are now nothing but shell pits and we are most 
of the time on the jump and many a time we 
find it convenient to take shelter behind a 

145 



HEART MESSAGES 



useful hill. Ofteu when desperately hungry 
we can take our choice — bombardment or soup. 
To get the soup we have to run the risk of 
meeting powder, so biscuits and sometimes a 
little canned meat have to keep us going. 

What's the use of trying to tell much about 
what is so big that there is no explaining it? 
Soldiers are not made of iron and sometimes 
they break even without powder or shell. 
Many a time they do not care if the break 
comes fast, especially when they get the blues, 
but usually men want to keep right on until 
this great cause is won. Hell on earth it is, 
and hell on earth it will be until the gates of 
Heaven are opened and Peace appears in the 
door and says: "Fellows, you come right in 
and stay." Until then, horrors must be and 
the men here must keep right at it and make 
of themselves fuel to keep the flames burning. 
Take it from me, while you are in X3eace, keep 
it, before you go to pieces. 

Verdun 



146 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



A French Soldier is a French Gentleman. 
( Translated by Eev. Francis J. Henning. ) 



You wish to know abou\ v . French soldiers? 
There is much to tell while the confusion of 
this war is approaching a crisis and men have 
not much time in which to write long letters. 

A French soldier, my friend, is not only a 
French soldier but, usually, a French gentle- 
man as well. 

You inquire so cordially, and the people, 
your friends, have been so kind, especially to 
the Belgian people, that it seems only right in 
recalling this, to send to you, and to them a 
few words of esteem. 

We have in France a greater general than 
was Napoleon. Certainly it cannot be neces- 
sary to tell you that the name of this wonder- 
man is — General Joffre. We have another 
wonderful general, also, and of course you 
have heard of him — the great General Foch. 
There are many others ; each and all of them, 
in their different ways, are the pride of France. 

147 



HEART MESSAGES 



The French soldiers have been like oldtime 
warriors. I was wounded myself and, having 
had time to rest, I watched the men at times 
and I am afraid that I thought that even in 
battle there can be a mighty grandeur. 

Tourists have often made remarks concern- 
ing the gayety of the Frenchman's nature. 
Tourists have never seen the Frenchmen in 
battle, however, and if they did the greatest 
souvenir they could carry away with them 
would be the memory of a Frenchman fighting 
for his country in the hours of his country's 
trial. 

Many of the soldiers, at times, have not 
known what sleep meant for many days and 
nights. Many of them fought on, even when 
wounded, not giving up until they dropped 
from exhaustion. 

Somehow, as I think of those soldiers as I 
saw them in battle, I try to look forward to a 
day when a dreaming artist will attempt to 
show on a painted canvas the French soldier, 
as he is, and has been, at his best. 

I have seen men, forgetting they were 
hungry, ignoring the thought of rest, and I 

148 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



have seen them, mud-stained and blood-stained, 
and always with the same eager, determined 
look in the eyes wherein the tourist saw only 
merriment and laughter. 

I have seen the soldiers breathe their last, 
wishing to live only to be of service, and I 
have seen men with open wounds carrying a 
mortally wounded comrade into the open jaws 
of danger, because another way around might 
be a rougher road and the wounded man they 
were carrying might suffer greater discom- 
fort. 

The men of France are fighting to free them- 
selves and their loved ones from the flames 
that are licking their way toward their coun- 
try for the purpose of consuming it at the 
enemy's will. 

I have seen soldiers whom I knew in Paris, 
that were known there as the gayest men of 
the city. Here some of them are the most 
serious men in the whole battle arrangement. 
They are untiring and unafraid of the tortures 
that threaten them on every side. No matter 
what comes their way, they seem to surmount 
it, and no song that ever will be written, or 

149 



HEART MESSAGES 



lines that ever can be penned, or pictures that 
may ever be painted will do justice to the 
French soldier as he appeared with arms ex- 
tended to protect his beloved country. 

Most of the French soldiers are tall and 
slender. If you understand the athletic build 
you will understand the endurance of the 
French soldier. 

The soldiers of France are not so far away 
from their homes as are many of the soldiers 
of the other allied countries. The knoweldge 
of this seems to give to them great comfort. 

One day an English officer said to me : "The 
French soldier in battle is a genuine moving 
picture." 

I think he described the Frenchman in bat- 
tle as they really appear to me, although until 
it had been suggested to me I had not thought 
of it in exactly that way. I am in charge of 
many men, but am forced to rest for awhile. 
Have I seen men die? Yes, I have seen many — 
too many of them close their eyes, for a noble 
cause. Only yesterday I was standing by a 
man's bedside when he suddenly opened his 
eyes. "France," he said, in a feeble voice } 

150 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



"France, you are my country ! On you I live, 
on you I die!" 

"You'll be better soon," I said to him. 

"I think so, too," he said. "Do you know I 
can see the old school-house and the bench 
under the big tree." 

"You know me?" I asked him, for I thought 
he was delirious. 

"Certainly I know you, Victor," he said 
smiling, and then I knew his head was per- 
fectly clear. 

"You'll be better soon," I assured him again, 
"don't give in, France needs you." 

"Victor," he said to me, as he looked straight 
into my eyes, "when a man's going out he 
knows it. It is then, Vic, the things of his 
childhood come back to visit him. A man may 
rest on the wounds of his country, but child- 
hood is kind for it takes him back into happier 
days, and somehow a man forgets his suffer- 
ing." 

Outside, the noise of war suddenly became 
louder. 

The dying man leaned on his arm, his eyes 
strained, as he tried to listen. 

151 



HEART MESSAGES 



"Hear that, Vic," he said, "that noise out 
there is brotherly love on the way to kill." 

I laid his head on the pillow. 

"I got this blow, Vic," he said, "helping a 
wounded friend to shelter. I'll tell you a little 
about him. When he goes back home he is 
going to be married to the girl I have always 
loved. I wanted that girl, Vic, more than I 
want my life now. But she didn't see me be- 
cause she was looking the other way." 

He stopped talking and he did not speak 
again. He was gone before sunrise, and the 
thing that hurts me more than my own wound 
is the fact that if I live I have promised to be 
the best man at the wedding of Victor's friend. 
So goes it with men in wartimes. As to ma- 
terial things, the property destroyed will count 
into the millions. But property is not human 
life and can some day be restored. 

The French soldiers send you greeting. 
Many of them say to you, and I join them in 
the same fervent wish, that we all may meet 
some day in Paris and then we shall drink to 
the health of those who are left and to the 
sacred memory of our dear, dead French 

152 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



soldiers, who so bravely died that France 

France. 



might live. 



They Tell Me She Is Beautiful. 

Not long ago the first shots were fired in 
France telling the people everywhere that the 
great battle was on. It is my sorrow to tell 
you! that early in the game I was wounded 
and am now being cared for by kind people 
in France. I have just left a hospital and I 
am with people outside of Paris. I cannot 
see to write because my eyes are blinded. A 
young friend of mine is writing down as I 
tell him to write, because I want the world 
to know, through you, how I feel and how 
some of the others feel about this horrible war. 

The plan of the Germans was to enter 
France by making a dash through Belgium 
with a tremendous army of ^Ye hundred 
thousand men. They meant to crush the 
French as they marched on, and on reaching 
Paris they meant to take it by a bloody storm. 

Two weeks ago they seemed to be near their 

153 



HEART MESSAGES 



longed-for goal and the hearts of many French 
families trembled in horror. 

The Germans came through Belgium into 
France and helped themselves to all the north- 
ern towns Koubain, Lille, and the chain of im- 
portant manufacturing towns in the Nord. 

People grew pale and looked at each other, 
almost afraid to ask questions. 

The Germans were within twenty miles of 
Paris. They were sending their aeroplanes 
over the city, dropping bombs in our midst, 
when suddenly they ran up against a strong 
and determined line of French and English 
artillery. 

The strength and bravery of those wonder- 
ful soldiers surprised the Germans and they 
were stunned by the strength and the stub- 
bornness of the men, they thought would be 
so easy. The German dream of an easy con- 
quest was rudely shattered, as mile by mile the 
German soldiers were driven back and those 
who ventured near were soon taken as pris- 
oners of war. 

In the office where I was employed before 
this war began, out of seventeen men, nine 

154 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



went to the front, and out of the nine brave 
fighting men, five have been killed, one mor- 
tally wounded, and I am waiting, not know- 
ing just what the end will be as I sit in the 
darkness of blindness thinking about the aw- 
fulness of it all. There are a few thoughts 
that give me comfort and one of those thoughts 
is the hope that out of the smoke and the 
suffering will come better ways for people 
who will follow when I, and such as I am — 
are gone. I would rather be blinded for the 
rest of my life than to keep my sight and see 
a scheming people crush my beloved country. 

My last walk through Paris was an event- 
ful one and I feel in the humor of telling you 
about it for it may be you will care to know 
and will care to tell it to all the friends who 
wish us well. 

I was standing on the steps of a cathedral 
watching the brave-looking English and 
French soldiers who were passing, when an 
Irish youth, with a handsome open counten- 
ance, stole quietly to my side and said in a 
low whisper : 

"It's yourself, isn't it, that's German ?" 

155 



HEART MESSAGES 



I was astounded. Curious to hear more I 
answered the young man saying I was a Ger- 
man. 

"It's yourself that's a dirty plotter as well 
as a German," he said excitedly, "for I heard 
you plotting against England and France !" 

"Be careful, young man !" I said, not know- 
ing what was coming next. 

"It's me that is careful," he retorted. "I 
was careful enough last night as I came from 
Vespers to write down in me brain every word 
that left your mouth. Don't think my hear- 
ing's bad for you said to your friend, the Ger- 
man beer keg that was rolling along beside ye, 
that you were one of the secret van who meant 
to girdle the world for the Fatherland. You 
see," he continued growing more excited, "it's 
me that happens to know a few words of Ger- 
man and I made out your plan." 

There was a silence for a moment and we 
both stared into each other's eyes. Then the 
young Irishman went on to accuse me. 

"You got your German friend to promise 
you that he'd be a link in your filthy brass 
chain, but when you were counting on him you 

156 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



forgot to count on me and the two ears, one 
at each side of me head." 

Again there was a silence until the Irishman 
spoke. 

"It's to a rope I'm going to give you and let 
it be soiled by doing it's duty." 

By this time I began to get awake and to 
see that I had made a great mistake. 

"Young man," I said, "You're mistaken in 
me. I'm not the man you heard talking at all. 
I wanted to hear what you had to say so I 
omitted to mention the fact that I am a 
French soldier and do not speak the German 
language at all." 

"No?" answered the young Irishman, 
staring at me, "Well then, if you're not Ger- 
man your mother must have had twin boys. 
One of them was born in Germany and maybe 
the other one was born in France." 

I laughed but the honest eyes of the Irish- 
man frowned into my face. 

"A French soldier should never run the 
risk of trying to fool an Irishman by claim- 
ing himself to be a German when he is only 
trying to find out things. I have only your 

157 



HEART MESSAGES 



word and that ain't much, so I'll keep an 
eye on you," he said, as he closed one lid over 
a handsome blue eye. 

"If there's murder hiding in your heart and 
you mean to put a girdle around it to send it 
around the world, maybe it's rough handling 
it'll get before it goes very far, so I would ad- 
vise you, if you see your twin brother to tell 
him to loosen up the links and use them for 
pegs to mend the old shoes that were on his 
feet." 

Three days later I was blinded. Paris, my 
beloved Paris, never to see again. No more 
to struggle for France, and I only a young 
man in my twenties. 

A, young lady comes often and brings me 
cigarettes. Sometimes she brings me presents 
and often in a low voice she sings for me the 
songs I love. They tell me she is beautiful, 
but even in the darkness I would know that, 
from her kindness to me and from the tone of 
her sweet low voice. Last night she placed her 
cool hand on my forehead and she told me she 
would always remain my friend. Somehow 
the darkness seemed suddenly to grow bright 

158 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



at her words and I painted pictures of things 
worth living for. I am growing to miss her 
when she forgets to come, but this she must 
never know. Some days she will marry a man 
who can see with his eyes and appreciate her 
and she deserves to be appreciated. But I 
pray God the day will never come when I may 
not know that she is somewhere near, and I 
am grateful that my hearing has been left me 
so that I may hear her voice and the news of 
victories. I am grateful for the love good wo- 
men give to broken soldiers and I have a great 
faith that those good women will never desert 
us in our need. It may be some will remember 
the broken soldiers they played with as chil- 
dren, only to throw away — but there were 
many children who pieced their broken sol- 
diers and have kept them and cherished them, 
on into womanhood and into old age. 
Vive la France! 

France. 



151) 



HEART MESSAGES 



THE SONS OF CANADA 

The fighting sons of Canada know a story 
Historians will write in years to come; 
Then, Canada shall wear a crown of glory 
Fair as the gold npon a noon-day's sun. 

No stain shall mar the history of her pages, 
Her sons were martyrs for the cause of Eight, 
Upon each brow, the hero's crown thro' ages 
Shall shine resplendent and with holy light. 

Adown the vale in memory's safe keeping 
We bow our heads in reverential awe 
For those, who in their silent tombs are sleep- 
ing 
For country, honor, and for Godly law. 



Lilies of the Valley Growing in Profusion. 

Tell me — can you tell me — are we walking 
backwards to the Dark Ages? Does every- 
thing go to a great height and then slip back 
to a beginning? Before we came here, we had 
too much joy, too many sweethearts, and I 
fear we did not then fully appreciate our gifts. 

160 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



Out here all the excitement we get is the hope 
of breaking into the enemies' lines and giv- 
ing them, in a milder form, some of the 
medicine they are so eager to deal out 
to us. Yesterday I saw on the border of 
the trench wild berries and lilies-of-the 
valley growing in profusion. The eyes 
of men strained across the border line of 
berry and flower, and as I looked I thought 
what a wonderful God-image is man. 

The wonderful French soldiers, they who 
have made the battle of Verdun immortal, feel 
they have only begun to use some of their pent- 
up indignation to crush back the foe. Some 
of the poor fellows were so blue that two rab- 
bits, running across the land and into the 
trench, afforded them untold amusement. 

When I was a little boy I imagined the 
Turk to be the most barbarous human being 
on the face of the earth. But the Turk is a 
gentleman compared with the German soldier. 
The Turk would not fire on the Ked Cross 
wagon and German soldiers have not hesi- 
tated to do this. 

If the world really knew some of the atroci- 

161 



HEART MESSAGES 



ties of the German soldiers the shutters of a 
civilized world would be closed in mourning. 

Drunken German soldiers have entered 
churches, have desecrated holy altars, have 
destroyed holy women, and they feel assured 
God has given them strength so that their 
right arm might do His bidding. Germany 
was made a nation by war, and a just retribu- 
tion will prove that by war Germany will fall. 

If the Kaiser envied Napoleon his con- 
quests, if he desired to achieve similar suc- 
cesses, can it be possible that he failed to take 
into consideration the shadows of a lonely fig- 
ure with bowed head reflected on the sands of 
the Island of St. Helena? 

Will the Kaiser yet write in the sands that 
neither wave nor time can erase five simple 
words — "Vanity — vanity — all — is — vanity." 

Somewhere in France. 



It Feels Like the Hand of the Devil. 

To write is a comfort sometimes, but I 
would be very sorry if what I write should not 
be of interest to you and to your friends. 

162 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



After all, most of us are only fragments of 
manhood, but then, we have been made that in 
order to prevent the German Emperor from 
giving as many of his men to death as he said 
he was willing to give in order to gain Paris. 
He said he would willingly sacrifice two hun- 
dred and fifty thousand German soldiers if 
by so doing he could gain the city of Paris. 
What do you think of such generosity? Hu- 
man beings to be given as the price of a city 
and to realize the dream of one human being. 
I am now slowly recovering from the effects 
of German liquid fire and German gases. It 
feels like the hand of the Devil, does that li- 
quid fire when it comes on you suddenly and 
burns you to the bone in its grasp. And the 
German gases are like the Devil's breath. I 
can never go back. I wanted to stay on and 
see the victory. I wanted to be one in the 
grand march going back home and to see the 
people's eyes lit up with joy. I'll be there too, 
if I am alive, but as both of my legs are gone, 
an old man seventy years of age, a friend of 
my boyhood days, has promised to push me 
in a rolling chair and get me into the front 

163 



HEART MESSAGES 



line where I can see the boys return. The 
gas came and helped itself to my lungs and 
the trouble is still going on. 

I have had a nice letter from my mother. 
"Oh," she said, "how I am longing for the day 
when you'll come marching home. I'm putting 
up in glass jars all the things you like and 
when you get back I know you will have a lot 
of new songs to sing. I can hardly wait to see 
you and to hear you sing as in the old days 
and maybe your voice is improved by a long 
rest." 

She doesn't know my voice is being eaten 
away. She can't see me with the other fel- 
lows marching home with victory because I 
have no legs to march on and I want to die 
before she finds all this out. God! How we 
fought at Verdun! Paris was behind us and 
the enemy was right in front. I tell you men 
had to shed their arms and their legs, even 
their lives, because there was only a strip of 
land betwen the heavens they owned and a hell 
that was coming on. Into our faces the Ger- 
mans spit the liquid fire and belched at us 
their terrible gas. We went back at them like 

164 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



human machines and not a man knew what it 
was to be tired. Humanity was the price we 
had to pay for humanity's sake, but now, as I 
have time to think, I ask myself when will the 
price of suffering be big enough to make a 



great Angel of Peace. 



France. 



Warfare. 

Warfare? What is it — trial? 

Yes. War is a melting place, 

Where men, and women, and children, 

Look Sacrifice in the face. 

Where the lordliest man from the manor, 

And the lowliest man from the street, 

Stand side by side on the battle-line, 

Where the watch- word is — Defeat. 

War — ah — well you know it, 
Since you went out there to the front, 
The hail of bullets, the groans of men 
All eager to bear the brunt, 
And you know the cold of the night-sky, 
The trench and the yielding mire 
The hunger, the thirst and the cannon, 
The flame of the liquid fire. 

165 



HEART MESSAGES 



War? 'tis the broil of the nations, 
Where each man must fight to the end 
Till crippled, blinded, defenseless, 
Death halts, a reprieve to lend. 
While strife goes forward, and onward, 
'Mid the roar and the crash, and the pain. 
As Anguish walks, shadowed by Comrades, 
To the music of thunder and rain. 

War — ah — well — some day 'twill be over, 
Then men will dream on through repose, 
While the mind will be canvassed by pictures 
Where Memory painted all those, 
Who leered from the enemy's army 
Now unknowing, and slumbering in dust, 
While the sun goes far, to the western sky 
And Time veils the cannon with rust. 

Then trumpets, grown weakened from calling 
To men in their unmarked tombs, 
Eefusing to come from their slumbers 
For the click of the war tale looms, 
Weaving, for those, who come after, 
A covering, broidered with deeds, 
While the Pioneer weeps for the horrors 
That grew for Humanity's needs. 

Then — the cup that was weighted by nectar, 
If it falls with a crash to the ground, 

166 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



If the hero, stands flushed, by the sunset, 

On the flag his Vanity crowned, 

If he waves it — far — far to the breezes, 

Soon it must droop into rest, 

He may see, in its folds, the shadows, 

Lying deep, in his own troubled breast. 

As he sees again the great conflict 

And the grit of his lordly ken, 

As they grasped from a war-mad sportsman 

A lasting victory for men, 

While the laggard coined dreams of a hero, 
As his comrades went forward, to do, 
To give at the Shrine of their Country. 
Their All, for a Cause — that was true. 
Then ! — Then he may see in the sunset 
On the flag that crimsons his face, 
The stain on the soul of his manhood 
For the blot he has been on his race. 
Words coined are empty echoes 
Unless from the mouthway of Deed, 
The struggle for right, is the voice that lives, 
To crush the vain heroes of Greed. 



*NOTE : The above poem is the one thous- 
andth poem that was sent to soldiers fight- 
ing under the Allied Cause by the Author. 



167 



HEART MESSAGES 



Edith Cavell. 

On various occasions you have asked our 
soldiers concerning the last day in the life 
of Edith Cavell. 

You will be interested to know I was talk- 
ing to her the night before she was taken a 
prisoner by the German soldiers. At that 
time I was impressed by her calm personality 
and deeply thrilled by the earnestness of her 
desire to be of service to the wounded soldiers 
of Belgium. 

The next day she was taken a prisoner by 
the Germans and later was accused of treason 
in trying to aid wounded Belgian soldiers to 
escape. To those wounded men Edith Cavell 
was as a beacon light that might suddenly ap- 
pear to men lost in a dense thicket from which 
there seemed to be no avenue of escape. 
Knowing her influence on the soldiers, she 
used it only as a means to encourage the men 
to hope on and to be patient. 

She was executed in Brussels, and on that 
dark day in the history of the German nation, 
strong men of the more civilized type grew ill 
and faint, but Edith Cavell was strong. On 

168 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



the face of the German military system the 
execution of Edith Cavell has left for all time 
an ugly scar, impossible to cover. Time can- 
not weave a veil that will be sufficiently coarse 
to cover the hideous mark. 

Edith Cavell went to prison, her head erect, 
and with her head erect, she died. 

After she had been court-martialed, the ears 
of the world must have heard the cowardly 
shot that sent a noble woman to her doom, 

But the ears of the world could not hear 
her voice as I heard it on that awful day when 
the light in her glorious eyes was extinguished 
because of her fault in having a kindly heart. 

Her sweet voice floated out on the Belgian 
air and it seemed to me, as I listened, to be 
floating upward to her God, where she had 
meant her words to go. 

Like a tall lily she dropped as from a stem, 
a smile on her fine countenance. 

While in prison, my dear mother, having 
had sufficient influence to gain an audience 
with her, went into her presence trembling 
and in tears. Imagine my astonishment when 
I saw my mother return from that interview 

169 



HEART MESSAGES 



with a smile of resignation on her dear old 
face. 

"My son," she said to me, "Edith Cavell is a 
saint. She is not afraid to die for she knows 
she is to die the death of a martyr. What a 
fine thing it must be," she continuel almost in 
a whisper, "to go to one's death with such 
a soul-offering for One who understands." 

From that moment, my mother seemed to 
take on new courage and at no time did I again 
find my mother weeping or afraid, as she had 
been before, but praying — yes — I found my 
mother praying, and at such times I have 
always turned away. 

The combined strength of the whole Ger- 
man military system was not sufficiently 
strong in their boasted strength to make of one 
noble woman a coward, such as the civilized 
world recognized Germany to be in its murder 
of Edith Cavell. 

The memory of Edith Cavell will never die 
and as time goes on that memory, like a fair 
flower, will grow the taller, so that pilgrims 
passing by her tomb shall not forget. 

Somewhere in Belgium 
170 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



The Belching Cannon Tell Us Nothing. 

More terrible than the Hell-trials of Verdun 
are the trials that are threatened on the 
Somme. Burrowing into holes like animals, 
we are trying our best not to admit the truth 
to ourselves. We come out of those holes only 
when we mean to attack. Many a man here 
knows that only deafness can make him in- 
different to the weird heavy roar and rumble 
of the cannon. You may well understand that 
a man's hearing, or his brain, or both, must 
give way if this keeps up much longer. Over 
two years have passed, and still the war goes 
on, gaining new heights but becoming more 
terrible all the time. No man seems tall 
enough to stand on his feet and rise to his 
toes where he can look down and see the end of 
it all. We know we are nearing the crisis, but 
the smoke, and the belching cannon, tell us 
nothing as to whether the day of victory is 
near at hand, or whether it will be delayed for 
another long horrible year. I can tell you, 
if the soldiers looked this thing in the face, as 
it really is, if they did not try to coax them- 
selves and each other into a make-believe of 

171 



HEART MESSAGES 



happiness, there is no doubt of it but men 
would be running around wildly insane, chas- 
ing the sound that took their wits away. 

A friend has promised to send me a kodak. 
If it comes I will take some pictures and will 
send some of them to you. They will, how- 
ever, tell only the stories of the outside of men. 
The minds of the men cannot be shown, and 
poor fellows, comrades of mine, I would not 
picture their minds even if I could. 

Last week we did not seem to have much 
to do but think, so someone suggested that 
we play cards. Don't you think we should be 
thankful that we now have some amusement? 
It is this great change in our condition that 
keeps body and mind together, and as for the 
soul, well, we will try to hold on to it unless 
the German soldiers send a plaything remind- 
ing our bodies and souls the parting hour has 
come. 

Did you ever hear of Hallam the Actor? He 
enclosed to me a copy of a letter he received 
from you and says when the war is over he 
means to make a picture of it. 

The German counter-attack here has been a 

172 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



failure. I tell you, the French have a fine posi- 
tion on a road not far away that is of great 
worth. The enemy has munition depots 
everywhere around the railway and the rail- 
way depots are feeling the knocks of our guns. 
All the same we would like to shorten the cut 
and get back home. If the end of this war 
comes quickly it will be best for us and you 
bet it will be best for the Germans, themselves, 
unless Germany wants to rid itself of the male 
sex. 

I heard a story concerning a British officer 
that I cannot vouch for as being entirely cor- 
rect. I was told that a regiment passing 
through London on its way to the front sud- 
denly saw something very amusing. One of 
the officers openly smiled and in consequence 
was confined in the barracks for a week or ten 
days. Some of the other soldiers in the same 
regiment smiled also, but for some reason they 
were not caught. The dignity of this incident 
was apparent to me after my first feeling of 
surprise had passed. I tell it to you so that 
you may appreciate the serious and dignified 
business war is to a great nation. 

173 



HEART MESSAGES 



As I finish this letter there is a stir along the 
line. If I live I will write you again. If you 
never hear from me you will understand the 
reason. I hope all who have been friends to us 
will take consolation in knowing that they 
have helped us when we needed friendship. 
So, I say to you now, that in war and out of 
it, may we all find rest in Peace. 

Flanders. 



When You are in a Hammock With Your 
Best Girl. 
You want to hear from us? Well just that 
much and more than that much, do we want 
to hear from you. You ask us if we are try- 
ing to be happy. Soldiers here, who are just 
plain civilians at home, and who found plenty 
of time in which to dance to merry music, need 
all their nerve in times like this. The cities in 
which the men knew happier days could not 
be expected to know any more than the men 
themselves knew of the wet fields, or the mud 
of dirty trenches, that were waiting for us. 
Nor did we ever dream of the rheumatic fevers, 

174 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



or the plain old fashioned rheumatism, wait- 
ing to make our acquaintance. 

I can tell you, starlight or moonlight is 
wonderful when you are in a hammock with 
your best girl, or when you are standing at the 
garden gate at the farewell hour. But a lot of 
weary men only waiting to get the other fellow 
before the other fellow gets them, get to think- 
ing about the hammock, the gate and the girh 
It is at such times you want to go out and! 
smash hard and get the whole job finished so* 
that you can get back again to your girl. 

A poor devil in the fires of battle needs re- 
ward better than a wooden leg, an artificial 
arm, or darkness in his eyes to remind him of 
war for the rest of his life. 

After awhile the world will go on just as- 
it did of old, but a lot of the poor fellows who 
will go back from this war, will be a sorry 
sight for merry eyes. It isn't so much that 
men will mind our deformities as it will be the 
love, we will miss through those deformities. 
There is hardly an unmarried man here but 
expects he will be a blank in the love market 
should he escape the shell, the cannon or the 

175 



HEART MESSAGES 



bayonet. Of course, the men who go back safe 
will be in favor with their sweethearts, but 
what about the other fellows, the poor bent, 
broken boys? They will not only have deform- 
ities but empty hearts for the rest of their 
lives. A fellow said something true to me the 
other day. He said to me: 

"Suppose our sweethearts should want to 
stick to us, no matter how much we are broken 
up. It wouldn't do them or us any good in the 
end. Why can't you see her mother com- 
ing into the room and with one sharp black 
look finish with her eyes what is left of a poor 
chap." 

Mothers will not be giving their girls to the 
fellows who go back leaving limbs and arms on 
battlefield. 

General Joffre is the idol of all France and 
he is a man of iron determination. 

The British men have been great fighters, 
too, and will make history. Sir Douglas Haig 
has been a wonder, and Colonel Winston Spen- 
cer Churchill sacrificed many things at home 
before he came to the front to do so much for 
humanity. Then there are those magnificent 

176 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



men, Mr. Lloyd George and Sir Edward Grey. 
They have all been doing great things for their 
country and for humanity. What all great 
men and small men want now is Peace. But 
the meanest man here is not looking for Peace 
unless that Peace is covered by the mantle of 
victory. Of course when a man stands between 
love and duty he sometimes wishes there could 
be a division made of him and while I am 
thinking on this a soldier near me is forgetting 
that he he is not giving me courage, for he is 
singing "I Wonder Who Is Kissing Her Now." 

France. 



Up the Stairs They Flew. 

As neither well-regulated London Bobbies, 
or the great God Himself seems willing to re- 
lease us from this mud-hole, we must stay on 
to fight it all out to a finish. It is dirty work, 
this, while decent men play hide and seek with 
a jolly lot of German ruffians who want to lord 
it over a peace-loving world. 

Only yesterday I heard a story and I want 
you to know it, and I want you to tell it to all 

177 



HEART MESSAGES 



the folks in your neighborhood. There was 
in Belgium an old farm-house that stood far 
back from the road. The Belgian family who 
had resided there for years had been driven 
away by the German soldiers and an old Ger- 
man made himself comfortable in the empty 
farmhouse. 

French soldiers thought they heard moans 
coming from the empty house and they stole 
quietly around the house and you bet they 
listened. In a little while they heard moans 
so the French soldiers smashed in the door. 
Up the stairs they flew and as the old German 
heard them coming, he fired shots right and 
left, but on and up the stairs went the French- 
men. There on the wall of the room the 
French soldiers found hanging by the pits of 
her arms a small girl about ten years of age. 
The old German, knowing it was all up with 
him, put a bullet into his own brain, but not 
until he had fired on the hanging Belgian 
child. She was dying at the time I received 
that letter, and by this time she must be dead. 
I guess the Almighty God knows his business 
in keeping us here a little longer, but we 

178 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



would be glad if lie would change his mind 
and give us a good chance to clean up quickly. 

France. 



The Girls Managed to Kun Out of the 
Open Door. 

We are so thankful for the great kindness 
that has flown to us from the hearts of people 
that we find it hard to find the proper words to 
express our gratitude. 

Oh, God, what a thing is memory! Why 
can't people just forget things that horrify 
when the same brain that sees without eyes 
into their past, cannot see even a little way 
into the dark future? 

I think of my nieces. I raised them from 
childhood and kept them by my side. There 
they had always been safe. I taught good 
lessons to them and it was a joy to hear them 
sing in the church on Sunday mornings. 

They were beautiful on the outside even as 
they were beautiful within. Their mother 
died when they were small children and their 
father was a helpless invalid. He was unable 

179 



HEART MESSAGES 



to walk, having at one time fallen from a tree 
and seriously injured his spine. 

Word came that the German soldiers were 
coming. It was nearly four o'clock in the af- 
ternoon and my beautiful girls came running 
to me asking me in a breathless manner to 
protect their father from harm, assuring me 
that the soldiers were nearing the house. We 
carried their father to the cellar of the house, 
bidding him to be cheerful, and assuring him 
that we would come for him as soon as pos- 
sible. Then we returned upstairs and waited. 

The soldiers came on, and the door of our 
home being wide open, according to orders, 
they entered. Immediately on entering the 
house, the German soldiers leered insultingly 
into the faces of the two girls. I stood between 
the soldiers and my nieces, but I was brushed 
away, receiving kicks as I lay on the ground. 
It was not until that night that I realized my 
right arm had been broken. 

By some ruse, unknown to me, the girls 
managed to run out of the open door and 
across the farm land toward the west. The 
anger of the German soldiers was terrible to 

180 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



behold. With oaths they ran after the fleeing 
girls. I saw them chase the girls across the 
farm, on which they had played during all 
their young lives. I called aloud to my dear 
girls to run for their very lives. I was like a 
man suddenly stricken mad. There was no 
one to resent my calling, for the soldiers were 
after the girls and I was left alone. 

That seems such a long time ago. I have 
never seen my darlings from that day to this. 
I look into the face of their helpless father, 
coining lies all the while to deceive him con- 
cerning the whereabouts of his daughters. 

That night, I saw many houses burning to 
the ground. It is my hope that our fair young 
girls are lying dead somewhere in the black 
ruins of those burnt homes. Does anyone blame 
me for such a wish? 

No one will, unless it be someone unac- 
quainted with the methods of the German sol- 
diers. 

Their father, not understanding, prays for 
their return. I pray they may be dead. Gone 
to their God on the pathway of their early 
training. 

181 



HEART MESSAGES 



My cousin, a mild, God-fearing man, a priest 
of a little flock here, one who was always 
grateful for the little church, and for the wel- 
fare of his few parishioners, was accused by 
the German soldiers. He was dragged 
through the streets at the end of a heavy rope, 
just as though he had been an old broom, in 
the hands of children at play. 

I received my education at a University 
when I was a young man. My education was 
a gift to me from an English gentleman, who 
rewarded me for once having done him a ser- 
vice in saving the life of his child. Through 
that gift I have been enabled to care for my 
little family, who consisted of my two nieces 
and their invalid father. Life to me now Is of 
but little value. Eunning across the farm, 
which I tried so hard to cultivate for the ben- 
efit of my loved ones, I will see all the days of 
my life, the forms of two fleeting girls. 

I am alone now with their invalid father, 
who is my brother, and at times my assur- 
ances fail to comfort him. At such times his 
shoulders shake with sobs that come from a 
father's breaking heart. All we have left now 

182 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



is Hope. We try to use that Hope to persevere, 
feeling that we will emerge in the eyes of our 
Saviour, a truer gold from the awful fires of 
almost unbearable trials. Some day — it may 
be — in God's own country, we may meet our 
dear ones and all our kind friends. Until 
that glorious day, we must pray on — we must 
wait — we must hope. 

Somewhere in Belgium. 



The Preacher in My Church at Home. 

The Sergeant here gave me one of your 
letters because he knew I was feeling mightily 
down. I saw three of my friends buried last 
night and, somehow, all along the line the men 
seem quiet and I know it is because they feel 
the loss of their friends. It is raining hard 
and the weather is raw and cold but I feel 
that if I begin to write I won't keep thinking 
about myself and of what I saw last night. 

There is not much to tell because I know 
many of the fellows here have written you all 
the news. I want you to know the boys 
thought a lot of the things sent them from 

183 



HEART MESSAGES 



your country and I wish you could see how 
they enjoyed the letters you sent. I tell you 
this because I want you and the good people in 
your country to know how grateful we all are. 
But I want to tell you a good one on myself. 
One day I heard a fellow say, "That big Aus- 
tralian looks as if he could lick the Devil him- 
self, if he made up his mind to it." 

Now the preacher in my church at home was 
always pleading and begging people to get the 
better of the Devil. When I got a bayonet stab 
and was laid up for good, I got to thinking of 
the words I had often heard in the church at 
home, and I compared them with what the 
fellow near me said about the big Australian. 

As I lay in the hospital one rainy day, who 
should be brought in on a stretcher but the 
fellow who had sized me up as being a good 
match in a fight with the Old Boy. He suf- 
fered a great deal and so did I, but after 
awhile when we both got to feeling a little 
better I told him what I had heard him say 
about me. "That's all right," he said, "so you 
could beat the Devil in a fair fight if he came 
after you, but don't forget I said the Devil. 

184 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



I didn't say War, you know, for nobody could 
beat war, since war is the Devil's master- 
piece." 

Then again I got to thinking that there's a 
lot of difference between fighting the fellow 
who wants to make a door in you, so as he can 
come in, — the fellow whom the very refined 
preachers call Satan, and fighting the fellow 
you can see with your eyes. It is easy to shut 
out the Old Boy, but when men are facing men, 
almost mad, I can tell you it's different from a 
quiet church service where a good man stands 
up before you and begs you to shut out a fel- 
low you've never seen. 

Why, it only takes one little spark of 
decency to kill the Old Boy, and all the time 
you grow stronger just because you chased 
him away. The whole map of life is a mighty 
puzzle. You get weaker here if you keep on 
fighting men. You get stronger all the time 
if you keep on fighting the Devil. 

Don't you wonder why this should be? 
Preachers have to sweat because they are kep,*: 
busy begging people to chase someone they 
can't even see. I never thought of all this 

185 



HEART MESSAGES 



until I came here, but since I am here, I know 
it ought to be an easy thing to chase one who, 
after all, is only a shadow. 

It must be a mighty easy task — the getting 
of a fellow's soul. Why, tp peel bodies away 
from souls keeps millions of men busy here in 
the war and all kinds of machinery bellowing 
morning, noon and night. 

I had a letter from a relative some weeks 
ago. He told me of a mighty queer experi- 
ence. He, with a lot of fellows, encountered 
a German shell, and the poor lads were blown 
to pieces and only my relative escaped with 
his life. One of his arms was blown com- 
pletely off and the remaining arm was blown 
back and pushed under his cartridge belt. He 
was taken away more dead than alive and for 
some time was kept in the field hospital. 
Later, he was returned to England, and is at 
the present time in a hospital in Manchester. 

Another fellow here had a letter from his 
folks in Scotland. You know the good Scot- 
tish people have argued that the German 
Zeppelin would never reach Scotland. Well, 
one night Scotland got a surprise party. A 

186 



FROM THE TEE3STCHES 



German Zeppelin arrived and looked Scotland 
over. Then down came the bombs and a lot 
of people were either injured or had mighty 
narrow escapes. But what would you say 
about one kind thing a German bomb really 
did? It landed in a pretty little Scotch gar- 
den and it seemed to like the looks of things 
there, for it refused to explode. The bomb 
lay on the ground of the pretty little Scotch 
garden while the people in the house, a few 
yards away, gathered together, frightened half 
out of their wits at the thing that was flying 
overhead, not knowing about the visitor that 
was just outside their door. 

The Scottish Government soon grabbed the 
bomb and put it out of business, thinking it 
wise for the Scotch people to find another type 
of plaything. 

If I ever get back to Australia I shall study 
for the pulpit. Come to see me, if I ever do 
get back home. I guess I'll have a little 
church, and if you are in the front seat I hope 
I will know you are there. If I don't know 
you are there, you just ask me to explain my- 
self, for I'll feel ashamed I didn't know my 

187 



HEAItT MESSAGES 



real friend was so near. But I guess you won't 
come and, after all, I may not fill a pulpit. 
Who can tell what I shall fill? Maybe some- 
thing will come across thei line and fill me so 
full of powder I may decide to take a long rest. 
If I live, you'll hear from me again. If you 
never hear from me, and if ever you go by a 
little church just think of the stranger you 
befriended and who thought well enough of 
your friendship to write this letter. Think 
of him as one who meant to do better things, 
had more years been given to his life. Don't 
think I'm sad about it, for I'm not exactly 
that, I'm only thinking of what might be. If 
ever you pass a little lonely-looking cemetery, 
you just remember a big boy who is sleeping 
far from his home and friends, but who tried 
to take comfort in knowing he died for his 
wonderful country and for those whom he 
loved. 

Flanders. 



I8S 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



America has Tattooed with a Kindly 
Touch. 

You say there are some very fine German 
American families in your country, who have 
no love for the Kaiser. You say, too, those 
German-Americans are highly respected citi- 
zens and many of them feel very badly about 
some of the things the German military ma- 
chine has been doing. 

Well, if they are ashamed of it, it shows 
they really have good common sense, and I 
guess that kind of people are really all right. 
If those people were in Germany they would 
be at us, but as they are not in Germany, it 
wouldn't be fair to show them the slightest 
disrespect. But I can't help wondering if they 
should be successful in compelling your coun- 
try to stop aiding us with ammunition if they 
would be willing to advise the shutting down 
of the great Krupp Gun Works in Germany? 
The Krupp Gun Works have been making 
things to blow us up for many a year, and it 
makes things big and strong so as to blow 
at us mighty hard. I always feel sorry for 
nice people having to bear the stigma of peo- 

189 



HEART MESSAGES 



pie who do wrong, only because they bear the 
same name, and I am glad to hear that the 
nice people and the kind people of Germany 
have all gone to America. 

America is a wonderful country and has 
tattooed with the kindly touch many people 
from many lands, and take it from me the nice 
people from Germany who are living in your 
great America should have no regret for the 
choice they have made in their new home. I 
am glad many of them have the good mind 
to dislike Mr. Kaiser. If they really dislike 
him it shows they know a thing or two, be- 
cause they can read between the lines of Mr. 
Kaiser's intentions. If Mr. Kaiser were to 
win in this war he would soon be burrowing 
American soil with his nose, smelling for 
trouble. That would make things in your coun- 
try mighty uncomfortable. I was in a field 
hospital, and as I got a good whack I was 
later sent to the American Ambulance Hos- 
pital at Neuilly, and while there I was treated 
very kindly and was sorry to leave. But room 
was needed, as men were constantly being 
carried in. 

190 



EROM THE TRENCHES 



As I write this letter a man just called to 
me to know to whom I was writing. I told 
him to guess. He said, "Well, you have been 
at it so long I know it must be a woman." 
I told him to mind his own business. That is 
the last piece of excitement that has hap- 
pened here. The other day I heard men com- 
paring notes. They were comparing their 
present life and their life in the day when they 
were at home. They were talking of the hap- 
piness that was theirs, but it might not have 
been theirs, since they didn't seem to be con- 
scious of it. At home it was work, rest, play, 
laugh, sing, good food, smiling faces, good 
beds at night, and a big kind clock to time 
each gift that was handed out to them. Now 
it is gunpowder, smoke, noise, sickness, dis- 
comforts and death. War is a brutal thing, 
but when a man is in it he is part of it, for as 
the machinery grinds, he soon becomes one of 
the cogs. At fighting time he thinks of nothing 
but fight. He fights like a demon and he is 
willing to fight like ten demons. 

I wish you could see the men getting ready 
when they know the fight is on. You should 

191 



HEART MESSAGES 



hear the mad, furious roar from the mouths 
of the wild, fierce, brazen cannons. It is a pity 
the whole world cannot see this war as it 
really is. Sometimes we rest while we are 
waiting, and we rest when we are wounded, 
and we rest when we are done with work for- 
ever. It is too bad that the feet that must 
walk through this war are made of mere flesh 
and blood. It isn't as I used to think of war. 
There isn't the music to spur on, nor prancing 
horses like one sees in picture galleries. There 
is just a dull booming that never changes its 
tune. Just the shriek and the moan, just the 
thud of bodies falling, sometimes man upon 
man, tier upon tier. 

When the fight is over, there are deep damp 
gutters men call trenches. There is the smell 
of powder that chokes the senses. There are 
men always looking for men's bodies, as God 
waits for men's souls. I saw two men who were 
writing to you, with tears streaming down 
their faces. Poor devils, they don't know just 
how long they will have a hand to write words 
or a mind to compose a sentence. If any good 
is in any of our letters, you tell about it to 

192 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



others, for like the men who in the days of 
peace give their bodies to be dissected for the 
good of those who may come on after them, 
so; we give of onr minds while there is yet 
time. We regret your country is so far away, 
but the sea has placed you on the other side 
of the map, and waters always wash clean. 

Flanders. 



THE TRAIL OF A SOLDIER'S DREAM 

Solitude, thou artist dreamer, 
Painting dreams, wherein I see 
Hidden paths, entangled, blooming 
Down the vale of Memory. 

Often there on hills I wandered, 
By my trembling shadowed side, 
While the silence, cold, immortal, 
Was my friend, my foe, my guide. 

On the prairie, or the desert, 
Hark ! I hear them calling now. 
Back, where dust of cities crowned me, 
I a King, and serfs must bow. 

193 



HEART MESSAGES 



Shadows danced on columned story, 
As the chiselled face looked down, 
Lips now mute tell not of glory, 
Shadows danced, they did not frown. 

Oh, ye heroes of tomorrow, 
Ye have light to torch the dawn, 
Though the green of earth is crimson 
And the veil of Mystery drawn. 

Hope, we mount you on tomorrow, 
Now so near, I cannot see, 
Through the curtain of the darkness 
That has fallen over me. 

On the silver, moon-beamed carpet 
There are wondrous hues designed. 
From the soul of deeds are patterns 
Wrought from catacombs of Mind. 

While a day draws near the telling 
Where the sunset waits to call, 
Night, all filled with stars, with moonbeams, 
And a God above it all. 

On the walls of Life's gray hallway, 
Lo ! — I see the forms of men, 
Men in conflict. God of valor 
Give them Peace with Thy Amen ! 

194 ' 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



We Staggered into the Holes and Stag- 
gered Out Again 

I am in London looking at a changed city. 
It isn't the buildings that are changed, for 
they are the same as they were before men 
facd each other to fight. The change is in the 
men and in the women. Men are seen every- 
where trying their hardest to get well of their 
wounds or making up their minds that if they 
do not get well they must just give in and let 
their lives ebb away. I stopped a fellow the 
other night to condole with him about his in- 
juries. "I'm not alone," he said, "I'm still in 
the army — the army of a new world that is 
walking through life on wooden crutches." 

Never while I live can I forget the day when 
I left the trench and went into the woods and 
then into the open. While we were in the 
woods — and before we got to the open — the 
bullets rained a horrible tune all round us 
and I fortunately became deaf; otherwise I 
think my brain would have become affected. 
Tree branches fell around us and big fine old 
trees shook and fell to the earth beneath our 
feet, while the earth was gullied as we stagger- 

195 



HEART MESSAGES 



ed into the holes and staggered ont again and 
shambled on. You should have seen the men ! 
God bless every noble soldier in this great 
fight, but thinking of that day I say fervently, 
God bless my countrymen, my Scotchmen. A 
lost finger was only a scratch if another man 
was worse off, and the four fingers left did 
active service for a comrade with a torn head 
or a broken limb. 

I am of the Scottish border regiment and 
am now convalescing here in London with 
some friends who are wonderfully good to me. 
I have been torn and broken, but I want to 
get well, as I want to get back to help the 
lads. Sometimes I think I am selfish to rest 
at all when I think of the lads who might be 
needing my right arm, and after all, it isn't 
my right arm that was injured. 

London, once so full of merry noise, seems 
to sing a sad song today. At night everything 
is dark. Do you know there is a fine imposed 
on anyone who has a lighted window at night 
in London? The top part of the glass street 
lamps is painted black and everything seems 
to be in mourning. Yesterday I read in a little 

196 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



book about things being purified by fire. I 
wonder if it is true. Hell is on earth, I know 
that, for I have been there, but no one ever 
came from a real Hell purified, for I am as- 
sured the real Hell can be everlasting. It is 
all a mystery, and in the meantime, war goes 
on. But let us pray that this Hell on earth 
may soon burn itself out before a world will 
be consumed by fire, for that is how it looks 
to me when I recall the terrific tortures human 
beings have been called on to endure. 

I am doing my best to get well, and for one 
purpose only. I want to get back and help the 
men put out the fire that is daily being fanned. 

London. 



Some Fellows Never Forget to put on Airs 

We are doing as well as can be expected, 
considering we are up against a big tree shed- 
ding tough nuts. 

Even in the mud, though, some fellows never 
forget to put on airs. Did you ever notice 
that? If you haven't noticed it maybe it is 

197 



HEART MESSAGES 



because you never saw a crowd of men making 
their home in a mud-hole. 

I guess it's habit, but as for me, I never had 
time to learn about it, because I had my 
sister's kiddies to raise for ten years after she 
died. There were four of them, and when I 
came here they all cried as if their hearts 
would break. Every blooming one of them 
followed me a-foot to the train, and there they 
stood until the train pulled out, and I waved 
my hat and laughed just as though I were 
glad, but of course, I wasn't. 

The more they cried, the more I shook my 
hat and laughed, but you bet when the train 
pulled away I felt mighty different. 

I was wounded — part of my face was torn 
away — but they don't know about it at home, 
and as they are getting on fine, I don't want 
them to know. I hear America is looking up 
about Mexico. It will be too bad if every 
nation must fight just because some bartender 
must have mixed up a turmoil cocktail and 
handed it over the counter for the whole world 
to drink. Did you ever read in your copy- 
book: "Be this your watchword, — trust God 

198 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



and keep powder dry?" Now isn't that fool- 
ish! Who would wet powder? And every 
blooming one must depend on God, for which 
one can defy Him by depending on himself? 

We are doing grand work here and we are 
gaining every day. But who knows about to- 
morrow? I don't, you don't, the Allies don't, 
the Germans don't, but God does. 

I've been half buried in mud and pulled my- 
self out of it only to go back into it again — 
then on the firing line, back to the trench, and 
then back again to the firing line. 

Our last charge was desperate. Men by the 
hundreds went down to the ground never to 
rise again. I saw pieces of men scattered 
around everywhere. The shells came on like 
screaming devils tearing and scraping the 
earth, and I can tell you they did scrape the 
earth and the men standing on it. As the 
fellows went down at the front more men came 
to take their places, and again as they were 
mowed down others came on, and as I fell 
myself, I did not see the finish. 

Men in the trenches have a frightful time 



199 



HEART MESSAGES 



living, not as men should live, or as some 
beasts are allowed to live. 

They are brave men. Oh, yes, I can tell 
you they are a brave lot! They put their 
bodies on the firing line so that others may 
be benefited, and they fall so that big things 
may some day be built up from them. 

Soldiers are the posts that bolster up 
nations, and I hope that those who are not 
soldiers will remember it, and if the posts are 
bent, I hope there will always be waiting for 
them a kind word or a friendly smile. I can 
tell you, just as other men here can tell you, 
that kindness in the shape of a friendly word 
or a good-hearted smile goes mighty far into 
a sick man's life before it fades. I am now 
going to write to the kiddies and I will draw 
for thein, a picture of a soldier eating ice 
cream. They will think it is true, poor little 
ones, and seeing that picture they will be glad. 
Why not make children glad, when trouble has 
already entered their lives, even without their 
knowledge. 

Somewhere in Flanders, 



200 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



I Salute the Ladies 

I salute the ladies of America, and the ladies 
of our allied countries, whether they be as 
angels of hope on the field of battle, or whether 
they be the most beautiful ornaments in their 
homes ! 

We have a fine hospital here, the gift of the 
Japanese Government, We have cute little 
nurses all wonderfully trained in the art of 
nursing, and we have had good reasons to 
learn how kind can be the true Japanese heart. 

I have told much to the Japanese nurses 
concerning the kindness of our good friends, 
the ladies. The fame of those friends has 
travelled far and has reached into every true 
soldier's heart. Our soldiers here are trying 
their best to be happy, trying to feel that vic- 
tory in the end will repay them for their un- 
sightly and sorry infirmities. The wounded 
men of Europe are at present nothing less 
than calamity on feet. Most of them, even in 
their sleep, hear the roar of artillery and the 
scraping of shells as they cut the ground. Too 
often the poor fellows cry out in their dreams, 
hearing the groans of dying men. 

201 



HEART MESSAGES 



At times the soldiers feel as though they 
were actually wearing dark glasses, so deplor- 
able does the whole world seem to their eyes. 
New noses are being made from metal; new 
jaws, new fingers, new limbs, to disguise the 
terrible disfigurations. 

Much that before the war was unheard of is 
now being invented because, alas! necessity 
has proven herself to be the true mother of 
invention. 

Paris in the old days always echoed every 
laugh, but I can tell you that just now eyes 
are wearing mourning, even if bodies forget 
to put on a sign of their grief. I was talking 
to a sweet girl who came to the hospital yester- 
day to comfort the soldiers. She brought with 
her some jellies and many cigarettes, but I 
felt there was a great sadness about that girl 
of which she might not like to speak. 

However, when she came to my side I begged 
her to tell me why she looked so sad. She 
looked at me and said slowly : "Is it not sad- 
ness that is hiding in every French heart just 
now? Have not French hearts become graves 
for their beloved dead?" Neither of us spoke 

202 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



for a moment, for I was surprised at her 
words. 

"You have lost some one?" I asked her at 
last. 

"Yes, I have lost three," she said, as tears 
came to her eyes. 

I thought, as I turned to look through the 
window, that even graves can overflow some- 
times when overcrowded. She passed on and 
left me to think of her and her words. Soon 
afterward, while a great thunderstorm was 
raging outside, a fellow who had been terribly 
mutilated came up to me and said, "You re- 
member the young lady who has just left you? 
She's my cousin. She talked to me for ten 
minutes before she came to talk to you, and 
she gave me cigarettes, but although we've 
been like brother and sister for the past five 
years, she didn't even know me. I hadn't the 
heart to introduce myself, knowing the horror 
I am now. I have liked that girl all my life," 
he went on to say, almost in a timid manner. 
"Now her lover is dead — was killed with her 
two brothers. She treated me with kindness 
because she knows I'm a sight for the Gods. 

203 



HEABT MESSAGES 



As long as I live that girl will never look on 
me again." 

I told him he was foolish not to let her 
know. But he shook his head. "I don't want 
her pity," he said, "Not I!" He went away, 
but I called after him : "That girl is mighty 
brave. Why don't you give her a chance to 
be your comrade, at least. You're not fair to 
her." He turned and shook his head and 
went on. 

When I was alone that incident made me 
wonder a lot about the different kinds of love 
there must be in humanity. A man can face 
all kinds of experiences for his country. He 
can be mutilated for his country, and he can 
die bravely for his country. But, he shrinks 
from facing the woman he loves, if his love 
for his country has spoiled his appearance. 

That brave man and I were side by side in 
a terrible encounter. I saw him when he 
went over a parapet and into a German trench 
in a hand-to-hand encounter, and I want you 
to know that the man who shrank from the 
eyes of one woman handled the enemy as if 
his muscles had been made of steel. He was 

204 



EROM THE TRENCHES 



carried into the dressing station later, and the 
men who carried him there fully understood 
they were carrying a hero. 

Now he is here with me, and I understand 
he is soon to receive a decoration for his 
bravery. Men in your country may appre- 
ciate the man's position and, after all, it is 
only by way of a little romance that I tell it 
to you at all. If I were a woman I'd hunt 
such a man as that hero is until I tracked him 
down. A woman can idealize love in the 
eyes of the man who really loves her. I would 
do that if I were a woman — just hunt him 
down, wouldn't you? 

From the Japanese Hospital in Paris. 



205 



HEART MESSAGES 



BLUE LETTER. 
I received a pathetic little note from 
a young soldier, who had seen one of 
my letters received by one of his com- 
rades, and in it he asked me if I would 
send him a letter and some verses too, 
as he would appreciate it highly. In his 
note he said: 

"Please write in the key of my own 
mood. I've had a Dickens of a time in 
life. Everyone I've wanted seemed to 
look at the people next door. If you 
write as I feel, it will make me know 
somebody understands." 

I wrote him a long letter and the 
verses — 

"THE PEOPLE I ALWAYS 
WANTED." 

(The Author.) 
N. B. — I regret that the Blue Letter 
was accidentally destroyed. 



20G 



KtOM THE TUEJSrCHES 



THE PEOPLE I ALWAYS WANTED 

The people I always wanted 
Were the people who didn't want me, 
For they went their way and left me alone 
On a boundless night-dark sea. 

The people I loved were people, 

Just people who didn't want me, 

Though I only asked for a smile or a word 

But my thoughts they could not see. 

They were people — just people I wanted 
But what did they know of me? 
I was only one in a moving tide 
That the world called Humanity. 

The people I wanted were people 
I loved, — and I wanted to feel the glow, 
That comes from a warmth of a friendly smile 
When the heart-throbs are ebbing low. 
■ 

The people I always wanted 
Could have lit in my soul a glow, 
By the magic wand of a smile or a word, 
Joy Archangels only know. 

The people I always wanted 
Sent a frown to my timid smile 
So I went my way, and from my sad heart 
I smiled on a world, — the while. 

207 



HEART MESSAGES 



What Kind of a Place do You Live In? 

Just now this war is near the hill-top and 
Germany is fast going down on the other side. 
We have gained the important points here 
and have taken many German prisoners. In 
the pockets of many of those prisoners there 
have been found notes and letters cursing the 
war from the start of it to the finish. One 
German colonel, who was taken a prisoner the 
other day, stiffened his neck and said in slow 
determined tones: 

"You can't beat us — no — not you — nor can 
all of the nations of the world combined beat 
us. We started out to win and we'll end by 
winning if we keep this thing up until the 
last man in Germany is no more." 

But win they won't, and bluff is what they 
are giving just now. Whoever saw bluff make 
the real thing? 

It is wonderful the change that has been 
brought recently into our living conditions. 
The things we get to eat now are luxuries com- 
pared with what they were at first, but every 
soldier, to a man, will be glad when the gong 
sounds and the jig is up. Not far away on 

208 



PROM THE TBENCHES 



the German side, ammunition is stored in 
every conceivable corner, and from morning 
until night the roar of the cannons and burst- 
ing of shells knock against the drums of a 
man's ears asking him to go stone deaf. We 
fellows often talk about the wonderful day 
that will mark the closing of this war and that 
will send us back again into civilization. 

What kind of a place do you live in? Do 
you live as I do, and as another fellow here 
with me lives? We live on the main road that 
divides a pretty village, and we often talk of 
the great day when the folks in our homes will 
be waiting for us. Gee! but we are anxious 
to get there. Fourteen fellows went from our 
village to this war and I know of five of them 
who will never go back. We sure do get blue 
sometimes when we think of them, for at home 
we were all good friends and we made many 
a jolly night of it when a day's work was over 
and we took turns at each other's home. 

One thing I want to tell you. Edward — 
who wrote you the blue letter, is dead. He 
was killed at Verdun, and when your letter 
came to me asking me to give him the lines — 

209 



HEART MESSAGES 



"The People I Always Wanted" — and when I 
found him dead as I held those lines in my 
hands I can tell you it made me shiver like a 
leaf. Edward was a fine, manly chap, but I 
always felt he had a love affair that didn't 
turn out right. 

Before I came here from Verdun I placed 
the lines — just for a minute — in his dead 
hand, and I wished mighty hard that at last 
poor Ed had found the people he always 
wanted. 

The cannons are roaring outside and there 
are things to do. I will write again if I live, 
but if you do not hear from me again remem- 
ber after the war is over that our friends were 
to us like lighted candles in a dark house. 

The Somme, France. 



I Went to See a Girl I Shall Call Marie 

Would you like to hear about my visit to 
Paris? I went to see a girl I shall call Marie. 
She was a bright, vivacious French girl, with 
large round eyes that darted fun at you at 
every turn. Her aunt, with whom she lived, 

210 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



hated me because I was a soldier. She de- 
tested fighting men and called each and every 
one of them a murderer. My sweetheart loved 
me, no matter what my name, but she loved 
me most just because I was a soldier. So I 
cared nothing for aunts or opinions so long 
as Marie was in the world. I went to see 
Marie when the day was at an end. She was 
at her window, waiting. I had been injured 
at Verdun and was only convalescing and my 
holiday season was drawing to a close. But 
who would not try to forget for a few days 
the awful war and moans of wounded men 
when somebody seemed to be calling? So I 
hurried on. 

I will not tell you what we said, Marie and 
I, but as we sat in the peaceful atmosphere of 
her home I seemed suddenly to hear a peculiar 
sound. Marie's aunt was ill in her warm 
blankets upstairs, so I knew that the noise 
could not be caused by a fit of temper from the 
ancient maiden, caused by the thought that a 
soldier was calling downstairs. From the 
noise on the street I knew something was 
wrong. Men on horseback rode furiously by 

211 



HEART MESSAGES 



the house, as horn-blowers blew loudly calling 
a warning. Then there was a deadly silence. 
For a few seconds I breathed hard, as Marie's 
fingers plucked nervously at a button on my 
coat. 

I ran to the window. Outside all was black, 
a sea of darkness. City lights had been sud- 
denly turned off and somewhere I could hear 
from the city streets a hoarse voice calling. 
As if by instinct I knew Marie had left my 
side and had gone from me to the open door 
leading into the street. 

"Descendez, Madame, vite, C'est les Zep- 
polins !" 

I roared for Marie to come back and made 
after her when a terrific noise stunned me and 
I could not move. My ears rang; my head 
reeled, and my vision seemed to go swimming. 
I picked myself up from the floor and tried to 
reach Marie. At last I found her lying face 
downward on the floor. I gathered her into 
my arms and we clung to the tottering wall of 
the room and to each other. All the time the 
debris was falling around us from shattered 
walls and splintered wood. Again there was 

212 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



another terrible explosion, and now that I 
think of it, that noise must have sounded like 
the noise in the days of old Pompeii. I held 
Marie in my arms and we both waited for 
death. Nearly an hour we waited, fearing to 
move, while around Marie's home people lay 
helpless in the city streets. That hour of 
waiting seemed to us like an eternity. Verdun 
with all its excitement, with its terrors, its 
victories, seemed remote during that terrible 
hour when I clung to the girl I loved and held 
with her to the side of a tottering wall. At 
last, by a great effort, I managed to get my 
sweetheart out to the street. Then the brave 
girl lost her courage and fainted dead away. 
The maiden aunt became my friend at last. I 
found her in an almost dying condition, under 
a mass of wood and plaster, and I laid her on 
a Zeppelin-damaged couch. 

During the next three successive nights the 
air-devil came to visit Paris. Terror was in 
every heart and remained there for many 
nights after. Twenty-four hours after the 
visitation, death claimed Marie's aunt. She 
died of shock, and Marie and I were married 

213 



HEART MESSAGES 



the next day. You asked about a Zeppelin 
raid. Well, I haven't told you much about it, 
for no human being has words to describe it, 
nor was there ever a pen made that could form 
the proper words. That form of warfare may 
be the highest in the air, but it is the lowest 
trick devised by a devil's brain. It came on 
to devour wherever it could, usually choosing 
women and children as its prey. A sleeping 
child lying in her crib and holding her beloved 
doll, was injured not far from Marie's house, 
and later I heard, the child had died. 

No matter where I travel in future years — 
whether on steam train or by boat, the hoarse 
voice of a calling conductor will always sound 
to me like danger, and I will always hear the 
words — 

"Descendez, Madame, vite. C'est les Zep- 
polins!" In France. 

Since We Don't Go Calling 

If you have good cats to spare why not send 
us a million of them? Cats like rats, and the 
men here hate rats. We get better things to 
eat now* better things than we ever expected 

214 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



to get to eat during war time, and you bet we 
are not coaxed to eat them, either. We just 
gulp the things down and wonder how on 
earth they ever came our way. 

We are not exactly vain about our looks, 
since we don't go calling. We're cleaner now 
than we were at first. 

Would you believe it if I told you we make 
our own music sometimes? Yes, and some- 
times we have games, but say, if it wasn't for 
always expecting a call to go forward, and 
not knowing when that call may come, I believe 
we'd rust and dissolve without our girls. 

We were glad to hear from you, but don't 
you think war is a picnic, for it isn't. It's a 
Cave Man a soldier must be, if he values his 
upper story. I used to keep my shoes polished 
like a looking-glass when I was home. It's a 
lot I care for mud on them now ; since coming 
here mud is part of our clothing. 

I haven't had a scratch yet, but expect a 
few — and maybe more. Most of my chums 
are either lame or laid out for good, so why 
should I expect a complete escape? 

When I was home I used to be mighty jeal- 

215 



HEART MESSAGES 



ous of a fellow who could dance like a breeze. 
The girls were all mad about him, and many 
a time I stood in the shadow and watched him 
surrounded by the prettiest girls for squares 
around. Now* he has a leg off and one of his 
eyes is gone. But he isn't going to show the 
white feather. He's going to learn to play the 
violin so he can watch other people dance, 
because he feels that unless he can do some- 
thing to make other people happy, no one will 
want him around after this war is over. 

We're all what you might call homesick, and 
that sickness seems to get worse every day, 
but we came here to win and you just keep 
looking for news. I am English and am proud 
of it, and I know our English soldiers have 
been doing wonderful work. At the same 
time, I know that all the soldiers fighting in 
this cause have been doing great work. The 
French soldiers are a fine, brave lot, I can tell 
you. Wouldn't it be great fun, after the war 
is over, if we could all meet and celebrate? 
Where do you say it shall be? Shall it be in 
London or shall it be in Paris? 

Flanders. 
216 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



One Sunday evening, while thinking 
over the morning service, and of the 
prayers that had been offered for peace 
in the European conflict, I wrote a 
letter telling of it to a soldier. To this 
letter I added the verses, "Steeples." 

(The Author.) 



Like Holding a Pretty Girl's Opera Glass 
You ask me what is doing on the German 
side. The German side is doing its — BEST. 

The German armies will not be quickly con- 
quered because they have been organizing for 
many industrious years. They will, however, 
end at the halting post of — DEFEAT. 

You watch the clock and then you will know 
the time, for the face of the clock has a good 
pointer on it, and if it is in good condition, 
it will be truthful. 

217 



HEART MESSAGES 



Have you secured a window to see the 
soldiers marching home with victory? 

In France some of my friends have chosen 
their windows, and in England a lot of people 
have made their choice, too. 

The worst battles, I think, so far, have been 
fought at Verdun and on the Somme. I was 
in the battle of the Marne and, while it was 
bad enough, it was tame to the battle fought 
on the Somme. 

If the enemy, or a shadow of him, appears 
anywhere, then, mighty quick, we find out just 
where our great generals keep themselves. 

The fog was heavy one day not long ago and 
our soldiers, fearing nothing, went right 
through the heavy fog and on the firing line. 
The Germans evidently felt uncertain of their 
mark and they retreated. There is a big old 
building just across the line where German 
ammunition is stored. 

The Germans are putting up a stiff fight, for 
they know they have reached a point where 
they are battling almost for their existence. 
The big men who are directing this whole Avar 
are, at heart, the kindest men imaginable. 

218 



FROM THE TBENCHES 



Some of the fellows here think that the 
Peace Contract — when it is finally signed, will 
be signed in Berlin. Others think the French 
and British troops will be marched right into 
the heart of Berlin, even before the signing 
of the Peace Contract. But most of the men 
— while they want Peace — want it only with 
victory, but if we win they do not care how 
soon the hour may come for the signing of that 
contract, nor do they care where the signing 
may take place. 

The under-dog here is treated just as well 
as the city swell, and the comradeship of the 
men helps to make conditions bearable. But 
all the same, we all long to see the city we call 
home, or the open country, or the quiet village 
place, or the farm, or any corner of the globe 
that holds everything really dear to the heart 
of a man. 

In your letter you painted a glowing pic- 
ture of the Sunday morning services in the 
city churches. It was a great comfort to know 
we .are all remembered by so many people in 
the hour of prayer. The steeples on those 
churches, of which you speak, — why, — to the 

219 



HEART MESSAGES 



soldiers here, — the steeples of churches at 
home would now be like the holding of a 
pretty girl's opera-glass that showed us a 
beautiful picture not far away. The churches 
are below the steeples, and the people are 
beneath the church roof. But we dogs of war 
seem apart from the church, and from the 
steeple, and knowing this, we hope the prayers 
of good people will find us patient. 

When the wind blows hard I try to make 
out if the prayers are whispering to us. One 
night I remember well; it was a moonlight 
night and one could almost see to read. I 
was thinking of your letter and of your poem, 
and I thought of your little verse called 
"Steeples." The wind was blowing softly and 
somehow I was thinking that maybe just then 
— for it was a Sunday evening — the people 
might be below one of those church steeples 
praying for us. In the moonlight I raised my 
finger, closing all the rest of my hand, and I 
tried to picture the steeple on my church at 
home. Then, without taking the written verse 
from my pocket, suddenly I remembered some 
of the lines, 

220 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



"Steeples are fingers, pointing to the sky 
From guiding hands, that hold all love; 
Pointing the way, a soul must wend, 
The trackless spheres above. 

"Steeples are fingers, pointing to the sky 
Far from the mart of grinding care, 
Piercing the air by night, by day, 
So silent, they seem at prayer." 

As those words passed through my mind, if 
there could be such a thing as reading one's 
thoughts, the fellows near me must have read 
mine. In low tones they began singing words 
that I remember having heard many a time 
in the churches at home. But whether I quote 
the words correctly or not, I cannot say. I 
only know the boys sang the following lines; 
and I joined in with them : 

"Sun of my soul, my Savior dear, 
It is not night, when you are near. 
Oh, may no earth-bound cloud arise, 
To hide me from my Savior's eyes." 

After they sang those lines several times 
there was a silence. Nobody seemed to want 

221 



HEART MESSAGES 



to talk. Hours later, I looked up at the sky. 
The moon had gone behind a black cloud. It 
was pitch dark. 



Some Fools Passed Under My Window 

Can you guess what happens to the "fill- 
ings" in some envelopes that travel from your 
hands? Well they are just passed on from one 
to the other, as you didn't say whether or not 
your confidences should stay "put." 

Please give me the loan of your ear and let 
a poor fellow who has had a good pointer from 
a bayonet knock a few words against the drum 
of your ear. 

How would you like to meet me some day, 
in a London fog, or a London sunshine, and 
have dinner with me at the Savoy? Now don't 
think I am growing extravagant ; I'm not, I'm 
only thinking of victory, and who wouldn't 
celebrate with the champagne of victory fall- 
ing like dew over one's country. 

Have you met anyone who wanted to make 
a bet that the Germans could break the spirit 
of Yerdun? 

222 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



Have you seen anybody who saw the Ger- 
mans limp into Paris? 

Not only did I get the point of a bayonet to 
remind me I was not liked, but I got a bullet 
as well, and as it liked its lodging place, it has 
decided to remain where it entered. 

Last night some fools passed under my win- 
dow singing "The Girl I Left Behind Me." 

That song kept me awake all night, for it 
brought to my mind how some creepy thief had 
stolen a small portrait of a lady friend I had 
been carrying. 

Just by way of comfort a fellow told me 
later that the Germans had taken it from the 
corpse of a fellow I had known, and as they 
did not like the lady's face at all, they had spit 
at it and trampled it under their feet. 

When I was injured for the first time I 
didn't exactly know it. What man could feel 
a body wound when the infernal regions 
seemed to be creeping around him, shrieking 
and burning through machinery until it got 
him? The earth actually shook beneath my 
feet, and try as I could to steady myself, at 
times I felt the task was impossible. At last 

223 



HEART MESSAGES 



I felt dizzy and went to the ground. I lay 
there for how long a time I do not know, but 
after awhile I opened my eyes. I couldn't 
move but I could see men moving through the 
smoke, their jaws set hard like bands of steel, 
their eyes bulging, while perspiration streamed 
from their faces. Many were bleeding but 
they went on with their work, taking no care 
of their wounds. Few men will ever go back 
from this conflict entirely sane. The roar of 
the whole conflict; the horrors of the sights a 
man has to face; the moans of the injured — 
and then, the loneliness, the longing for home, 
will leave its mark on the men who will be left 
to tell the awful story. 

I saw a man leaning over his companion. 

"You're not all in, Frank?" I said. "You're 
only scratched, don't you be frightened; say, 
don't you give up." 

"Thanks," said the dying man, "I must give 
up something, Dan. I must give up — my soul. 
There's no use, I can't hold on." 

"Can I do anything for you, Frank?" I 
asked him. 

"Yes," he whispered. "You go away. The 

224 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



bullets are all around you and you'll get 
caught yourself." 

"Have you any message for your friends, 
Frank?" I asked hurriedly, for I was in awful 
danger. 

"Oh, yes," he said with a sigh, "tell people 
to make something to guard their country's 
honor, something stronger, something that can 
endure better than flesh and blood." 

"I will," I said. And then, suddenly, I got 
caught myself and I went to the ground. 

Soon the American Ambulance fellows came 
along and were on the job. I tell you the 
American Ambulance boys are a fine crowd 
of men, and many a fellow has had good reason 
to remember them and their kindly acts. They 
take but little recreation and are as cool as 
cucumbers in the very teeth of danger. 

A friend of mine saw them at a baseball 
game the other day, and he was filled with 
admiration when talking of them to me. Base- 
ball is about the one recreation they take, and 
only take that occasionally to keep themselves 
in condition. I tell you those fellows drive 
their ambulances straight through the danger 

225 



HEART MESSAGES 



line while they sit erect and not in the least 
bit afraid, even when they drive through a 
Dante's Inferno. 

I can tell you, and I think you will agree 
with me, that if there is such a place as Hell, 
peace cannot be found there. Therefore, peace 
cannot come to this war until the pot that has 
been so long a time stewing trouble is 
thoroughly cooled down. 

The women have been wonderful. Some 
time ago, and not a long time ago at that, I 
used to oppose, with all my voice, the Suffrage 
question. What a fool I was then. I can tell 
you if women had the vote men wouldn't be 
broiled over this greasy hot pot of the present 
time. Most of the men who have come here 
whole will go back in parts, and I honestly 
believe not even part of the men would go 
back at all if the women did not have a hand 
in the game. I think some of the lines in your 
verses very good and very true. Especially 
the lines which read : 

Out of a curse, a blessing may arise, 
Hell is on earth, there is God in the skies, 

226 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



While man, the Dictator, demands to dictate, 
The strength of his love, or the power of his 
hate. 

Oh man, all subduing, you kill to subdue. 

You humble the mighty, exalting the few, 

While the weak, become weaker, the jest of the 
strong, 
And Peace is the discord in war's battle- 
song. 

Queen Mary's Convalescent Hospital at Cimez, 
France. 



I Wasn't What You Might Call a Good 
Man 

I do not know if you are an Atheist. I do 
not know if you are a Christian, or if you are 
of the Jewish faith. I only know, for I have 
noticed it over and over again, that the men 
in this conflict who have a reverence for God 
have been the men who have had the greatest 
courage. 

Before I came here, I wasn't what you 
might call a good man. But I can tell you 
that my brain has been called on to hustle 
since I came here, and I have thought things 

227 



HEART MESSAGES 



out with that mysterious gift of ours called 
Vision. 

The soldiers who have had a great faith are 
and have been the strongest men. Usually the 
Atheist is a weakling when he is called on to 
face a real trial. 

Before I came here I was indifferent to all 
things that did not spell material comfort. I 
just went on, and when the years came to meet 
me, I usually greeted them, each one at a time, 
with a case of whiskey and a lot of jolly com- 
panions. 

We didn't get home until morning, in those 
days, and when we did get home, it was always 
an ugly grouch we took home with us. 

Then came the call to arms. It came as 
suddenly as did the realization that we would 
have to leave the good things of life behind us. 
Some of my friends of the Rye Bottle an- 
swered the call and very soon I followed. A 
day came when we knew we could no longer 
have the sprees of old, and for a long time we 
missed it. Many of us, down in our hearts, 
would rather see cases of whiskey wheeled up 
to the trenches than watch the smoke tell us 

228 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



of things done on the enemy's side. Just be- 
lieve me when I tell you that some day when 
we fellows first came here, if we had known 
the cannon's mouth was filled with rum that 
might be sucked out even at the risk of an 
explosion, we'd have gone to the mouth of that 
cannon for a try. 

I am writing this letter with my left hand, 
and from a hospital near Paris, and as I look 
at the vacant space where there used to be a 
hand at the end of an arm, and when I think 
that that hand used to furnish me rum, I just 
can't understand, somehow, how it all came 
to me — the resignation, I mean, for the loss 
of the rum and the loss of the hand. 

It wasn't the lost hand's fault that I drank 
sometimes like a slimy fish. It was the fault 
of habit and foolish companions. 

I tell you it is habit that makes cowards of 
people who might have amounted to some- 
thing if they had just strengthened their habits 
down a proper path. If a fellow who decides 
he wants to become a drunkard would just 
swallow some powder and then put a lighted 
match down his throat and end the whole 

229 



HEART MESSAGES 



comedy of errors, it would be best for him and 
a lot better for other people. Say, don't you 
imagine the trenches don't teach a lot of 
things. 

The first thing the trenches teach a fellow is 
self-control. Then there are no corner saloons 
handy, and no beet-nosed drinker can go into 
a trench without having his nose become pale, 
and soon he takes on the look of a better man. 

The skin of my nose and face used to have 
an inflamed appearance, and I was usually a 
fool for people to laugh at, all but my mother 
or my sister. There were usually tears in my 
mother's and sister's eyes. They suffered — 
I know now since I have become sane — and it 
would be only right if they were glad for the 
day that sent me here. 

But a knock on the flesh often wakes up a 
man's soul. 

Here, I see men going into battle with a 
prayer on their lips, and I've seen men die, 
calling to be forgiven for the wrongs they have 
done. I have heard the war noises and once 
above the confusion I heard a voice calling — 
"Lord God, will you receive my soul?" 

230 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



In that very same hour I heard a man who 
had never believed, curse the name of his 
Maker, loudly proclaiming that such as He 
never did exist, but if such a one had existed, 
he never would have allowed him to die in that 
way. One day I saw a fair youth, a boy who 
did not look to be more than eighteen years 
old. He was calling his mother's name and 
then suddenly he lowered his voice and I could 
see he was softly praying. In trouble — it 
seems odd, doesn't it — that a man's mother 
and his prayers seem close together. 

Faith is a queer thing. Somehow, it is like 
a shining steel band that carries us across 
many troubles when the smoke is thick around 
us, closing out the beauties of nature. It is 
then one must look to the inner self for beauty, 
and if it is not there, a man is lost indeed. 

If a young man just beginning manhood can 
put down craving for strong drink, the battlf 
for big things is two-thirds won. The young 
man who begins to crave whiskey is already 
half insane. You tell the boys of the whole 
world this for me. You tell them that I asked 
you to tell them, because in a little while I am 

231 



HEART MESSAGES 



going to nry long home and from there I can- 
not send them advice. Tell them that not 
only was I injured, but my lungs are almost 
done, for I got a German treat from their 
liquid fire. Tell them I wrote this with the 
hand that is left, and tell them I have been 
three days writing it. Tell them it is my last 
will and testament, and tell them, and I know 
they will be glad to hear it, that although I 
have led a foolish life, it is my trench experi- 
ence that has sobered my brain and that at 
last it has given me a chance to be prepared to 
meet my God. Tell them that no one has ever 
seen anything good come out of a whiskey 
bottle. 

Tell them when the glass bottle is broken 
and when it has been thrown away that the 
evil that came out of it, still lives. 

It is growing dark. I am not strong. As I 
look through my window the evening star is in 
the sky. You will excuse me if I am tired. 
Tell my brothers of the world I hope they will 
receive in kindness my last will and testament. 

France. 



232 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



THE DREAM MAN. 

Out from an ocean of lminan blood 
Comes the man of a life-long dream. 
Night falls low on the barren shore 
And the man, who is gray and lean. 
Long has the exile slaved in his dream 
On the cannon, the shot, and the shell, 
But now he awakes to himself as he is — 
A toy of his home-made Hell. 

His mantle is red from the hearts of men, 

His brow is furrowed with care. 

All ye who behold him, see if ye will, 

But blame him? Do, if ye dare. 

For he willed it not, since the loss is his, 

To conquer was only a game, 

But now, as he looks o'er the crimson sea, 

The wild dream-tale grows tame. 

Out of his dream as the years go on, 
On and into the great Beyond, 
Will be shattered chains of his wish to bind 
And the blood-lust of which he was fond. 
He has builded guns for his own defeat, 
He dreamed of all men as small, 
So he climbed on his foolish Will and smiled 
On men he has found to be tall. 

233 



HEART MESSAGES 



Out from the plan of scheming years, 

Out from an ocean of Strife, 

Out, far out, on the moving sands, 

Goes a man with his dreams for life. 

The sands 'neath his feet may be washed away, 

For the incoming tide must be fed, 

But the man, alone with his empty dream, 

Must be mocked by a tide that is red. 



The sun will go down to a western sky 

As a moving world goes round, 

But the blood of men, from a man-made dream, 

Will forever remain on the ground. 

Red roses may climb from those stains of 

Strife 
While the dew comes to silver the red, 
But the war-mad man of shattered hopes 
Must remain on his war-made bed. 



Go you to your island and dream your dream, 
Go you to your island alone ; 
War music for you as you watch the tide 
Will be only your Nation's moan ; 
Blame whom you will, the blame is yours, 
The world hath eyes and ears. 
You are the man of the bloody thirst, 
Do you ever have ghostly fears? 

234 



FROM THE TRENCHES 



Well, — if you have, you may use them all 

On your isle by your crimson sea. 

They may dance for you on the foam of the 

tide, 
As winds sing in minor key. 
You are the man of the tragic mind, 
You are the man with a Will. 
You are the man who planned to do, 
Through dreams, you aimed to kill. 



We Have Seen Things 

Was there ever a war without a tail-end? 
Certainly the tail-end of this war is a long 
one, for all the colors in the rainbow seem to 
have been mixed up with it, and the end is a 
long way off. It is too bad to put all of those 
colors into muddy, dirty trenches where men 
so often come out only to be caught in the jaws 
of death and then as the saying is, "he is all 
in." 

Just let any loose-tongued loafer come air- 
ing his views on this war to any of us fellows 
if ever we get back. Just let him bob up from 
his loafing place to instruct us how the war 
should have been run and the neighborhood 

235 



HEABT MESSAGES 



of that man won't be a safe place for anyone 
foolish enough to loiter just for the sake of 
looking on. You bet we fellows know a little 
about a war. We have been frozen stiff only 
to be melted again, and then to be toasted and 
half skinned. We have ducked and we have 
hiked, and we have faced the enemy and we 
have spent sleepless nights when our skins 
were nearly cracked from exposure. We have 
seen things; we have suffered everything, and 
we have kept right on, but we won't keep on 
long enough for a quitter to tell us what we 
should have done, or to hear how he would 
have improved things if he had had a chance 
to lead this war. 

I got word through my cousin in France 
that the ambulance he was driving, when 
it was filled up with wounded British soldiers 
had been fired on by the enemy. Some of the 
wounded men died soon afterwards, and my 
cousin, who was driving the ambulance at the 
time, was badly wounded and has been laid up 
ever since. 

Do you know, I wish I had my cows here 
so that the delicate ones here could get good 

236 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



fresh milk. I wish I knew just how it feels 
to be in a country far away from war. I 
wonder if you appreciate it, or if you would 
like to have some experience and know what 
troubled countries are really like? 

Flanders. 



To You, Dear Soldier of Your Troubled 
Country. 
The following letter is a copy of the one- 
thousandth letter written and sent by the 
Author to the soldiers fighting for the Allied 
Cause. 

Today, at sunrise, while strolling on the 
beach by the side of the Atlantic I met a badly 
crippled man. As he approached me, I real- 
ized the man was whistling a tune. As he 
limped by me and away, I recognized the tune. 
It was "The Star-Spangled Banner," that 
beautiful sacred song of my country. As the 
flute-like tones died away in the distance I 
looked out across the sea to where the sky 
line seemed to come down to the brow of the 
ocean. Far across that sea I knew there 

237 



HEART MESSAGES 



was much suffering, and the tune of the whis- 
tling man brought to my mind the full real- 
ization that the flag of my native land can 
only be sighing, — that it cannot dance again 
in the free air until brothers across the sea 
shall be released from the cruel conflict that 
seems to have crushed peace from out the 
souls of men. 

A little while, and the crippled man was 
lost in the distance and the gray mist that 
seemed to have come in from the sea. I 
watched the irregular foot-prints the crippled 
man had made in the sand, and as I did so 
an inner voice seemed to be whispering — and 
I listened. 

If one must be crippled, how much better 
to be maimed for the cause of one's country. 
If one must die, what glorious privilege to die 
for one's country — to be buried in honor and 
to be coffined by one's native flag. 

You, my brother, you who have heard the 
lament of your native land, — you who have 
listened, you who have answered— you have 
proven that you gave no thought to suffering 
that might be in store for you. 

238 



FItOM THE THENCHES 



You went nobly to serve your country, 
choosing for yourself the part of heorism, and 
martyrdom if necessary, for your country's 
ideals. You have not lived your life in vain. 
Such as you can never die in forgetfulness. 

War, always deplorable, is sure to mark 
newer paths. Let us hope those paths will 
lead you on and upward until, at the summit 
of your ambitions, you will find the better 
way for which you are striving. Beyond the 
sky-line no man may see. But as we look, 
we hope, and as we hope, we believe. We 
believe that out of the dark mire and the mis- 
ery of this awful conflict will some day bloom, 
and for all time, the white Resurrection Lily 
of fairer things to be. 

Some day, when the war is over, suffering 
will speak to you in a newer language. From 
the trials through which you are now passing, 
you will enter through the gateway of future 
years. There, painted images of suffering will 
look at you from canvases, and art, will mean 
to you things you never before understood. At 
other times, when to your soul there comes 
the voice of music, Memory will waken and 

239 



HEART MESSAGES 



you will answer the throbbing notes by a silent 
and fervent prayer for a peace on earth that 
shall be everlasting. 

If you suffer — and you do suffer — try to 
remember a mother-world would soothe you if 
she could, calming your agony into slumbers 
that would lull into forgetfulness, if only 
for a little while. You are not forgotten. 
Your brothers and your sisters of the world, 
whom you have perhaps never seen, are work- 
ing for your comfort, thinking of you, pray- 
ing for you. Often, when city clocks bridge 
the midnight hour of that which was and that 
which is to be, memory remains motionless, 
and although motionless she refuses to rest. 

If it should be so written, if you must be 
gathered into the love of your Eternal Father 
— my brother, do not, I pray you — do not go 
with the bitter kernel of hatred steeped in the 
cup of your noble soul. You would not give 
that bitter drink — your heart filled with hat- 
red — for your Bedeemer's drinking. 

As you stand by your country, so will you 
stand by your God, in justice — in right to 
defend right — but always in sorrow that suf- 

240 



PROM THE TRENCHES 



fering must be inflicted, so that right might 
reign to give righteousness unto all mankind. 



The poem — "The Voice of Peace" — 
was found in the hand of a dead Bel- 
gian soldier, as he lay on the field of 
battle and was later returned to 

The Author. 



The Voice of Peace. 

I heard a call. Upon the forward battle-line 
I stood; 

What cared I there, for slaughtered brother- 
hood? 

Discordant moans awoke opposing song 

That told of Triumph on the field of Wrong. 

I looked above. My lips were kissed by drops 

of falling rain. 
I looked again, and lo! the lightning came, 
A sword of fire, preceding thunder's roar 
That man has mocked, to make the tones of 

war. 

241 



HEART MESSAGES 



Give me thy hand. The voice was hushed by 

Greed, 
Pointing the crimson path, where for him men 

might bleed. 
I turned away. My friend was now my foe, 
His heart my goal, to send a deadly blow. 

I raised my eyes. My flag was waving high 
'Tween Heaven and Hell it seemed, saluting 

earth and sky, 
While Sorrow's tears e'en as the evening 

stars 
Jewels of little worth to cover Hatred's scars. 

Waken from dreams. A dawn is softly call- 
ing to a day 

Where blue-birds, waking, unaffrighted stay. 

Where memory-crosses, looking from the 
ground, 

Point to the rifted cloud. A rainbow makes 
no sound. 

"Thou shalt not kill." The laden winds are 

calling unto me; 
Look up! behold your flag, and seeing, bend 

your knee. 
Lay down your arms! Give Peace the sword 

and gun, 
A victory gained by them is only war begun. 

242 



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